Bobby Whalen impress in 5-4, 10-inning defeat – Hoosiers get swept
by Carl James •@jovian34 • February 22nd, 2022
In the past few years there have been some really great games where Indiana came up just short in the end. Texas Regional Final in 2018 and Louisville Regional elimination game in 2019 come to mind. The Sunday game in the 2022 opening series at Clemson joins those. It was a back and forth affair with tremendous plays and gritty performances by players on both teams. An electric environment that ended with the home team victorious and the visiting Hoosiers coming up just short.
A casual observer may have expected after two days of routes that game 3 was going to be anything but competitive. On Saturday night, coach Mercer stressed that Indiana was setup well pitching wise to compete for the win on Sunday. Compete they did. Coach Mercer stressed in his postgame discussion with iubase.com that he was pleased with the team fundamentally, especially on defense, and the bounce back they showed after the beat downs suffered Friday and Saturday.
Four Hoosier pitchers, while not perfect battled and never let the moment get too big for them, unlike what we saw on Saturday. Nate Stahl produced the best Hoosier start of the series, going 4+ innings. Lefty reliever Grant Holderfield was dominant against the left handers in Clemson’s heavily left-handed line-up. Braydon Tucker held the game tied in late innings and Luke Hayden did what he could in tough situation to try to extend the game.
The star of the game for the Hoosiers was center fielder Bobby Whalen. With four hits he lead the Hoosier’s offensive attack. On defense he had a play for the ages catching a fly ball over and behind the left centerfield wall, robbing Clemson of a home run.
The aforementioned web gem from @IndianaBase centerfielder Bobby Whalen (@bobbywhalen2). Not only went 6-for-14 with a pair of doubles, watch him scale the wall to take a run off the board. Stick around for the side angle at the end of the clip. pic.twitter.com/jVfJgfMmu7
— Burke Granger (@burkegranger) February 21, 2022
Indiana managed to outhit Clemson 9-7 on the day including a home run by shortstop Phillip Glasser. Hoosier pitching control, while much better than Saturday, did lead to several free bases by Clemson who capitalized to score 5 runs on only 7 hits and ended the game with a walk-off sacrifice fly. Clemson swept the series, bringing Indiana to 0-3 on the young season.
The Hoosiers Tuesday game has been postponed indefinitely due to rain in the Oxford, Ohio, area and Friday’s first pitch against #2 Arkansas at Round Rock, Texas, has been moved up to 5pm ET due to unusually cold weather in the region. Perhaps a day will come when the boys of summer will get to start the season in a time other than the dead of winter. But alas, I digress.