Penn State Baseball Series Grades vs. Minnesota
Penn State continued its winning ways in conference over the weekend.
The Nittany Lions took two games out of three against the Minnesota Golden Gophers. The series victory makes it back-to-back series wins against Big Ten opponents.
Here’s how each position group performed for the blue and white this weekend.
Offense: B+
Overall, it was a successful weekend for the Penn State offense which saw several players step up in key roles.
Starting with the usual, Matt Wood had another great series where he picked up an extra base hit in each game including a triple in the opening matchup.
Two home runs were hit by the Nittany Lions and both came off the bat of Billy Gerlott.
The latter of which was a pinch-hit three-run home run which gave the Nittany Lions the lead which they would never relinquish.
In the final game, Penn State picked up just five hits which was the lowest total of the three games despite the winning outcome.
Penn State recorded six hits in the only loss and 12 hits in the other win.
Despite the totals, the Nittany Lions only outhit the Golden Gophers in one of the three games.
Pitching: B-
With those high-hit totals from the Golden Gophers, that made the job for the Penn State pitching staff that much harder.
The performances from the three starters during the series were very mixed throughout the weekend.
During the middle game of the series, Penn State got a much needed gem from starter Travis Luensmann.
Luensmann was able to keep the Golden Gophers out of the score column in a game where the Penn State offense struggled to score until late.
The sophomore pitched for six innings while striking out four batters and only allowed three hits in the process.
Once taken out, Luensmann was followed by reliever Tyler Shingledecker who only allowed three more hits to secure the win.
That start was unfortunately sandwiched by a Jaden Henline start, which was going fine until the fifth inning and a rough start overall from Steven Miller in the final game.
Even with that Miller start, the Nittany Lions only allowed one more run after taking him out leading to a weekend with more positives than negatives.
Logan Bourandas is a third-year majoring in broadcast journalism. To contact him, email lxb5412@psu.edu.
