There were no runs to be found for K-State baseball Tuesday in Minnesota. A dominant performance by Minnesota Golden Gopher’s pitching staff shut out the Wildcats 5-0 in the first game of the two game midweek series.
It was just the third time this season that K-State had been held without a run and the second time by a nonconference opponent (George Mason). The other was TCU early this season.
K-State senior starter Mark Biesma held the Golden Gophers to seven hits, but three of those were extra base hits – including a triple that would end up scoring a run and two home runs resulting in three players crossing the plate.
Minnesota’s final run came in the eighth inning as the home team scored on a sacrifice fly to cement the 5-0 decision.
While the Minnesota offense was efficient — scoring five runs on seven hits — K-State’s was not.
The Wildcats only registered one hit with a one-out single by junior infielder Tyler Wolfe after Minnesota starter Toby Anderson threw six innings of shutout baseball, facing the minimum number of batters.
K-State had a chance to do some damage in the eighth inning as both freshman outfielder Dominic Thornton and freshman infielder Ethan Klosterboer were walked to load the bases with two outs. The opportunity was squandered, though, when freshman outfielder and reigning Big 12 newcomer of the week Sam Chadick flew out to right field to end the inning and leave the three Wildcats stranded.
K-State was only able to get five people on base total in the game including three walks, one hit-by-pitch and the aforementioned Wolfe single.
Senior outfielder Max Brown, who was leading the team with a 16-game active on-base streak, saw that streak snapped as the veteran went 0-3 on the night. Wolfe now holds the largest streak at eight-straight games.
Biesma earned his second loss of the year in a four-inning outing, allowing two runs on three hits and a walk.
With the lack of offense on the Wildcats’ side, K-State played its shortest game of the season coming in at two hours and eight minutes.
This was K-State’s first loss in Minneapolis, Minnesota since March 27, 1994. K-State’s last win there came in 2011-12 season, where the Wildcats outscored the Golden Gophers 17-9 in two games.
Up Next
K-State will stick around in Minnesota for just a little while longer as they finish up the two game series with Minnesota today at 1 p.m.
Starting pitchers have yet to be announced for both teams.
