Kyle Ruchim’s game-winning hit traveled just 40 feet.
After 11 thrilling innings of baseball which included a right fielder reaching over the wall to save what would have been a go-ahead home run, a rare 5-2-3 double play to escape a bases-loaded jam and a managerial ejection, it was the sophomore shortstop’s bunt single that gave Northwestern (11-22) a 4-3 win over Wisconsin-Milwaukee (13-20).
“Any win right now is important,” coach Paul Stevens said, “but to sit there and have things sway back and forth the way that they did and then the way that these guys responded, I’m very happy for them because I think, emotionally, it’s a huge, huge momentum changer for us going into the weekend.”
The game-winning rally began with Zach Morton’s perfectly placed bunt down the third-base line. The redshirt junior second baseman’s bunt was so good that Panthers pitcher Jake Long never bothered throwing over to first base. Instead, he went to work on Paul Snieder, who originally held his bat out for another bunt. But the senior first baseman no longer needed to lay down a sacrifice after Long’s first pitch came in low and squirted under catcher Paul Hoenecke’s glove. Morton advanced to second on the wild pitch and then moved to third on a balk from Long.
That brought Ruchim up with the bases loaded and nobody out, and after watching the Panthers flub similar situations earlier in the game, Stevens called for a safety squeeze. The shortstop obliged with a bunt down the first-base line. Long sprinted over, but in his rush to pick the ball up quickly and fire it home, he missed the ball, and had to watch as Morton sprinted home with the winning run.
“It was a slider away, a little bit up and away, so actually not a hard pitch to bunt,” Ruchim said. “Not a ton of movement on that pitch and it’s usually not super slow. So (I) squared (off), kind of went with the pitch a little, went with it to the right side; pretty easy pitch to get at though.”
It didn’t always appear like such dramatics would be necessary. The Wildcats clung to a 3-1 lead after a three-run outburst in the bottom of the second, and held that advantage into the seventh, when senior hurler Michael Jahns helped them escape a bases-loaded jam with a curveball in the dirt that Jonathan Capasso swung at for strike three.
“My curveball is my best pitch,” Jahns said. “When I want to get people out, I’m going to throw my curveball as many times as I can in the count. The fastball is just the show-me pitch. It’s not overpowering but it will get me by and it will show them that I have something else to worry about, but the curveball is the out pitch.”
After saving NU from a sticky situation in the seventh, Jahns was unable to work out of a self-made jam in the top of the eighth. He began the frame by surrendering an infield hit and a line drive single, and hard liners by shortstop Nick Lingvay and second baseman Michael Porcaro tied the game at three.
Jahns kept the score tied with a curveball down the middle that center fielder Luke Meeteer swung and missed on, and he relied on his curveball once again in the 10th. With the bases loaded and no outs, he got Meeteer to strike out once again, this time on a low curveball that just barely grazed the dirt. He got the next two outs on a hard chopper to third baseman Nick Linne that the sophomore threw home on. After getting the force at home, senior catcher Geoff Rowan fired the baseball over to first base to complete the double play.
Of the 13 batters Jahns set down on Tuesday, seven struck out, but it was still a peril-filled outing for the senior. Even in the 11th inning, the only frame in which Jahns set the side down in order, he had to watch as Capasso belted a ball deep toward the right-field fence. Replacement right fielder Jack Quigley had to use every bit of his frame to reach over the wall and make the catch.
“I’m just glad that Quigley is six-feet-four-inches because he saved the game for us, for sure,” Jahns said. “I was a little worried when I saw it going back and I saw Quigley running back and he caught it and I just put my arms up and I was stunned. I don’t know how many balls I’ve seen robbed at this field. I think that’s number one.”
Minutes later, the Cats had snapped a seven-game losing streak in stunning fashion.
“It’s pretty emotional because you’re dealing with a lot of ups and downs,” Stevens said. “You’re on a roller coaster. Your stomach is in your throat and then at the next minute, it’s dropping down to your toes. There were a lot of things emotionally that can take it out of you physically and they kept physically staying in the moment.”
The light bunt down the first-base line carried the Cats a long way.
“Any kind of confidence booster, any little bunt, anything that can spark the team is a big bonus,” Ruchim said. “Whether it be a bunt, a single, a bloop hit, whatever it is, it always is good to get something going.”
