Michigan baseball vs. Illinois to open Big Ten tournament
The Michigan baseball team will need to stay hot if it wants to make a deep run in the Big Ten tournament or beyond.
The bracket for the conference’s doubleelimination tournament was released Sunday, and the Wolverines (28-25, 12-12 Big Ten) are the No. 5 seed in the field.
U-M will take on No. 4 seed Illinois (31-20, 17-17) in the opening round at 9 p.m. Wednesday at Charles Schwab Field — which will host the College World Series next month, per usual — in Omaha, Nebraska. The two teams did not play one another in the regular season.
The winner of this game will play the winner of No. 1 seed Maryland and No. 8 Indiana. The Michigan-Illinois loser will play the MarylandIndiana loser on Thursday.
The tournament is scheduled to wrap up on May 29, with the winner earning an automatic bid in the NCAA tournament.
Michigan had won its previous three games before Saturday’s 18-12 loss at home to Rutgers to end the regular season. The Wolverines have scored at least nine runs in each of their last five games and have scored the third-most runs in the conference (419). But the team ERA is 7.03, second-worst in the Big Ten.
Michigan State finished 12th in conference play and did not make the Big Ten tourney, which is limited to the top eight teams in the conference.
The Wolverines are coming off two consecutive NCAA tournament berths; in 2019, they finished one win short of taking the College World Series, and in 2021, they lost their first two games (including once to Central Michgan) to finish last in their regional. (There was no tournament in 2020, due to the coronavirus pandemic.)
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