It was the bottom of the ninth with the score tied 5-5 on Senior Day.
Senior Tony Vercelli waited in the on-deck circle for his last time in his career.
“Before the inning, Coach (Paul Stevens) came up to me and said, ‘You know you’ll get a chance to win this,'” Vercelli said. “And I said, ‘I hope I don’t get a shot because that means we won.'”
Vercelli got his wish and never had his chance to hit. With one out, freshman Paul Sneider calmly stepped up to the plate and launched a walk-off home run to seal a 6-5 win for the Wildcats and complete the doubleheader sweep of the Wolverines (30-25, 9-5 Big Ten).
In a season full of late-inning losses and unlucky breaks, Northwestern was able to finish the season on a strong note Saturday. The Cats were finally able to accomplish what they couldn’t all season – avoid late inning collapses and secure their first Big Ten series win.
“We’ve been battling this year with injuries and one-run losses and even though we had a tough game on Thursday, we said we would come out today and try to win two games,” Vercelli said.
Stevens said that after dinner on Friday, the whole team walked out with one thing in mind – a desire to win the final two games against Michigan after losing 16-6 last Thursday.
“We’ve been there all year and we’ve done a lot of the things you need to do,” Stevens said. “We just somehow haven’t been able to put the nail in the coffin.”
But Saturday afternoon, the Cats hammered in their first nail with a 10-6 victory in the opening game of the doubleheader.
The Cats entered the bottom of the fourth inning down 5-1. NU closed the lead to 5-4, after scoring three runs off of a Vercelli home run and two runs off of a freshman Quentin Williams’ two-run double. The Wolverines answered with a home run of their own in the top of the fifth, to take a 6-4 advantage. But that was the last run they would score.
The Cats’ offense came to life in the bottom of the fifth with four runs, and tacked on two more in the sixth to secure a 10-6 victory.
“It was well fought by both sides and it was just one of those games where someone has to win and we’ll take it,” senior Tommy Finn said.
The Cats have struggled to hold on to leads this season. But they were able to shut out the Wolverines in the last four innings, thanks to the efforts of sophomore pitchers Eric Jokisch and Cole Livermore.
Despite giving up six runs in the first five innings, Jokisch settled down and held the Wolverines scoreless until he was relieved by Livermore after the eighth inning. Livermore was able to get out of a bases-loaded, two-out jam to give the Cats the win.
Halfway to its goal, NU started strong in the second game, taking a 3-0 lead after four innings behind the pitching of junior Joe Muraski. Muraski matched his career-high of eight strikeouts in the first four innings and finished the game with ten.
However, success was short-lived. Muraski allowed three runs in the fifth and two more in the sixth, giving Michigan a 5-3 lead.
NU’s offense didn’t let up, answering with a Sneider two-run homer to even the score in the seventh.
While the Cats have struggled with relief pitching all season, freshman Zach Morton rose to the challenge. Morton kept Michigan scoreless over the last three inning, setting the stage for Sneider’s game-winning heroics.
“It was a gift,” Vercelli said. “I thank the underclassmen for playing hard and leading us to two victories. The season was a little rough but you can’t do any better than ending on two wins in a doubleheader.”
