Baseball BTT: Tournament and Iowa Preview

Michigan will open up their portion of the Big Ten Baseball Tournament Thursday against Iowa. The winner advances to the semi-finals of the championship round, the loser falls into a pit of despair also known as the loser's bracket.

Iowa owns a 2-1 record against the Wolverines, but they've already thrown their ace Jarred Hippen in order to get to this game. Michigan comes in fully rested and with all its pitchers at Rich Maloney's disposal.

A brief review of the regular season meeting and some thoughts on the tournament after the jump.

Reviewing the Recap

Michigan's series against Iowa was extremely disappointing. After the opener was delayed by rain, the double header on Saturday started bad and went to worse in a hurry. From the recap's series thoughts:

Obviously this was a huge let down to drop the series. Unfortunately, the worst case scenario for Friday happened. I kind of had a feeling it might, but I assumed it was just my normal pessimism. It wasn't. I'm not sure if there's specific blame any one can place. I'd call it a team effort. The leadership both of players on the field and coaches couldn't pick it back up in game two, and that's just something that has to be treated differently next time we face a double header.

Alan Oaks was a huge culprit of the game one close loss to Iowa. In 5 innings, he gave up 5 hits and 5 runs while walking three and striking out three. This came just one week after a premature announcement on my part that Alan might be back to his early season form. With Oaks likely to get the start against the Hawkeyes, how he starts is definitely the key to the game. If he walks a couple of batters in the first 2 innings, prepare yourselves for rough seas ahead. If the outside corner is a bit loose with the home plate umpire, expect good things.

In the other two games, Michigan let Iowa run away with the momentum in the second game of the double header. Bobby Brosnahan had a start much like Oaks and Michigan was unable to get the offense going. Nick Brown of the Hawkeyes put forward a good start, spreading 5 hits and 2 runs over 6.2 innings, walking two and striking out 5. He will probably be who Michigan sees on Thursday. His last start was against Purdue, lasting 6.2 innings, giving up 7 hits but only 1 run on 2 walks and 4 strikeouts. Brown does lean toward being a ground ball pitcher, but it's around a 2:1 ration ground balls to fly outs.

Game three was a bit more offense geared, with Brandon Sinnery putting forward a solid 4 innings in the start, and Burgoon spreading 3 runs over 5 innings with 5 Ks. Phil Schreiber threw for Iowa, giving up 6 runs (2 earned) over 5 innings with 8 hits, 2 walks, and four strikeouts.

Michigan regulars against Iowa:

Had Michigan, you know, won this series, LaMarre might have been Big Ten player of the Week again. This was also the start to Biondi's average dropping from .386 to .327. Dennis missed the entire series with an undisclosed shoulder injury.

Iowa in the Tourney

Iowa played one game so far, beating Purdue 7-4. That marks Iowa's 4th win in a row against the Boilermakers in exactly one week's time. In their opener, Iowa started their ace Jarred Hippen, who went 7.1 innings, giving up 10 hits and 4 runs while striking out 5 and walking none. This allowed Iowa to conserve their bullpen, throwing Zach Robinson just one inning and using closer Kevin Lee only 2/3 of an inning to get the save.

The Hawkeye bats have been extremely hot over the last week and a half, and that hot streak carried over into the tournament. Leadoff man and centerfielder Kurtis Muller was held hitless but he still scored two runs. Zach McCool and Mike McQuillan both went 1/4, with McCool collecting 2 RBI and McQuillan one. Ryan Durant went 2/4 to continue his recent streak as well.

It's also worth noting that in the defeat of Purdue, the Boilermaker coach Doug Schreiber made one of the strangest decisions I've seen any coach make in quite some time. Schreiber decided to save his ace and Big Ten strikeout leader Matt Bischoff for the second round. That blew up in his face as his second starter Matt Morgan started to fall apart in the 5th inning.

Morgan had a great start against Minnesota, leaving in the 8th win the win intact. His 2 runs on 6 hits, one walk, and 7 Ks should have been enough to win had it not been for the Purdue bullpen struggles. So saving Morgan, not Bischoff, for the second round would have made plenty of sense.

So instead of throwing his best to avoid the loser's bracket, the Boilermakers will have to win 6 games in the next 4 days to make the NCAA tournament.

Because of this ridiculous decision, I consider Iowa lucky to be playing us.

Key Matchups

Assuming Alan Oaks to be the starter, the key match up becomes Oaks against Iowa's 1-4 hitters. If Alan can get through the lineup the first two times unscathed, I think Michigan should be sitting pretty. If Oaks throws 6+ innings, I think Michigan wins this game.

Iowa's bullpen may not have been used much yesterday, but they did use their only true relief threats yesterday. It'll be interesting to see if they perform on a high level on back to back days. Michigan's hitters need to take advantage of Iowa's young starter, whoever that may be, and try to get to the bullpen early. Cue captain obvious comment.

A last key, the playing surface at Bill Davis. There have been some tricky hops in the first two games, and that won't be any better tomorrow. Here's hoping Derek Dennis plays well.

Prediction

I think Michigan wins this game with a score around the 8-5 range. I'm leaning to a bit bigger lead, but that hasn't really been Michigan's game this season.

For those of you who catch the game on the Big Ten Network, be sure to tune into the late game as well. Indiana will play Minnesota, and Michigan is almost assuredly going to play one of those two somewhere along the line. Michigan absolutely lucked out in getting a bye, and they got even luckier that the second round of the tournament has ended up in this match up.

I would have hated to see Michigan face Bischoff and Purdue, and getting Iowa instead of Northwestern seems like a blessing. Not to mention Minnesota has to face the only team in the tournament that I think is capable of gorilla balling Minnesota into the losers' bracket, leaving a potential Michigan versus Indiana match up in the semi-finals and the Hoosiers out of pitching.

Can the luck continue? Can Michigan make their own luck? Only time will tell.

Game is at 3:35p ET on the Big Ten Network. I'll be hopefully commenting live from Buffalo Wild Wings as it's the only place around that I can get wifi, beer, and the BTN for quite a long drive.

Go Blue. Beat Iowa.