Dillo Day is an all-day party, so wild it happens only once a year — and the Northwestern baseball team wants no part of it.
The Wildcats (30-25, 13-15 Big Ten) begin play in their first Big Ten tournament since 1995 Wednesday, facing top-seeded Minnesota (36-20, 20-8).
If the Cats can string together some wins and stay alive in the double-elimination tournament, they will be on the road for Saturday’s festivities.
“I would really love to skip Dillo Day this year,” senior Kris Musselman said. “If that means that we’re playing for the Big Ten championships then I’m all for missing it, and I think we all are.”
The road to that championship starts with a big obstacle in NU’s way. The Cats open the tournament against the conference’s best, facing the Golden Gophers at their Siebert Field.
Still, there is room for optimism. The Cats split the teams’ earlier four-game series, sweeping a mid-April doubleheader 4-2 and 8-2. NU coach Paul Stevens said his team could have won three games that weekend.
Being pitted against the tournament’s top-seed could have another advantage, Stevens said.
“I love this matchup because the tournament is basically set up for the first-place team and we’re facing them,” Stevens said. “(Minnesota) came in here and I guarantee you they were happy as heck to come out with a split.
“Everything that I hear from a lot of people is that we were the club that they didn’t want to play.”
The Cats are a team to be feared because they’re ending the season on a hot streak, winning five of six conference games to snag the tournament berth last Saturday. Clinching early last weekend gave NU a chance to rest its starters for the postseason.
Senior Dan Padgett will likely get the nod Wednesday and he’s earned it, improving steadily as the season progressed. Padgett (6-2) beat Minnesota April 15 and finished the season with a 3.45 ERA, a great number but still only third on the team.
Sophomore starter Zach Schara (8-4) led the team with a 2.71 ERA and fellow soph Gabe Ribas (7-3) finished second at 3.29. Still, the Cats will need their bats to be booming if they look to advance.
In the two wins against Penn State, those bats scored 11 and 12 runs and got home runs from pinch hitters Jason Anderson and Matt Thompson to seal Saturday’s win and the tournament berth.
“We’ve had a lot of team wins,” Musselman said. “We don’t have one guy we have to rely on, because just about every time it’s somebody else. Other team’s can’t concentrate on one of us, but have to worry about every single one of us.”
That team concept goes for the starting rotation and also for the offense. The Cats have 10 batters hitting above .290, led by Joe Hietpas’ .381, and nine batters with home runs, led by Hietpas’ five.
But the regular season and postseason are different stories. Although none of the current Cats have played in a Big Ten tournament, they are not satisfied with just making an appearance.
“It’s like we’ve been saying since the day we first started in January, when you get into the tournament, anything can happen,” Stevens said. “As far as I know, when the ump yells, ‘Play Ball,’ the score is 0-0 and all of the teams’ records are the same, so we’ll find out who came to play and who hasn’t, and that’s an opportunity we’re looking forward to.”
So while the rest of campus looks forward to Dillo Day, the Cats are hoping to skip the parties this year. NU has reached a tournament it hasn’t seen in five years and if it can play even better, it might have the best time of all.
“I don’t know if there’s anybody that really knows if this team has peaked yet,” Stevens said. “I think that there’s a lot more baseball in this club and we’ll find out if I’m right this week.”
