On a beautiful Saturday afternoon with Rocky Miller Park nearly filled to capacity, it was a perfect opportunity for two big-time pitchers to show their best stuff. While Ohio State’s Brad Goldberg struggled, Northwestern ace Luke Farrell stepped up.
The Wildcats (20-18, 8-11 Big Ten) protected their home turf with a dominating 8-0 victory over the Buckeyes (30-14, 12-7). It was the first game of the series after yesterday’s matchup was rained out.
The senior Farrell allowed just two hits in eight innings, while a six-run second inning from NU gave Goldberg his first loss of the season. He walked two batters and hit one, but it was just as much the bats of the Wildcats as it was Goldberg’s mistakes. Northwestern collected four hits, with a single from senior first baseman Jack Havey driving in the last run of the inning.
After giving up a single in the second, Farrell turned his game up even more by allowing no hits for the following five innings. With the lead that Northwestern had, there was no reason for nervousness, and he looked cool as ever.
“There’s no pressure on me when we’ve got eight runs,” Farrell said. “You go out there and throw strikes. A couple times I got outside of myself and had a couple walks here and there, but we played great defense and they put a ton of runs on the board. No problem.”
Havey drove in another run with a third-inning single, and a sacrifice fly from senior shortstop Trevor Stevens made it 8-0. Farrell finally gave up another hit in the eighth, and with the game all but secured, he could hand it over to junior closer Jack Quigley and be happy with his performance.
“I was able to throw my fastball on both sides of the plate,” Farrell said. “Their lineup had a little bit of trouble with that; it was keeping them off-balance, especially the left-handers, being able to come inside on them.”
Quigley finished off the win for Farrell without allowing any hits, and the 'Cats came away with a rare shutout. They’ll go up against the Buckeyes again Sunday at Miller Park.