Illinois Baseball visit Baylor for three games

This weekend, the Fighting Illini head back to Texas to take on the tough Baylor Bears for a three game series.  After their successful trip to Arlington last weekend where they won three of four games, the Illini hope to build on their Big Ten leading 7-6 record.

It won’t be easy though.  This will be one of the biggest challenges of the non-conference season.  Don’t let Baylor’s 7-6 record fool you.  They are a top notch team.  They were ranked #23 at the beginning of the season.  The cause of their somewhat mediocre record is their tough schedule.  They have played higher ranked teams like Rice, UCLA and sometimes even beat them.

Illinois’ probable starters have been announced.  It seems that freshman Kevin Duchene is getting the weekend off (or more likely, he may get a chance to come out of the pen if needed.  Kevin Johnson (left), Nick Blackburn and John Kravetz are the slated starters.  Friday’s game is one to keep an eye on.  Johnson (2-1, 3.44 ERA) will be facing Baylor’s big ace Dillon Newman who is 2-0 with a 1.62 ERA.  I’d like to see Big Ten’s best offense raise his ERA a bit.

There weren’t any players around back when these two teams met but it wouldn’t hurt to mention that it’s time for payback.  The last time these two teams played, Baylor defeated Illinois by the score of 20-6.  Let’s reverse that score, guys.

Take note that the schedule for this weekend will be slightly different.  There will be one game on Friday and a doubleheader on Saturday.  No games will be played on Sunday.  Catch up on studies, players!

If you want to dole out some money, you may be able to access live audio and video of the Baylor games this weekend. There’s more info on the fightingillini.com preview page. Of course, there’s always GameTracker too which is accessible via the schedule page.

Stat of the Week

Straight from the official Fighting Illini weekend preview…

Illinois is leading the Big Ten with seven wins and in six offensive categories: AVG (.312), OBP (.406), runs (77), hits (120), RBI (69) & BB (56)

Keep the hits comin’!

Random Ramblings

Speaking of the Fighting Illini preview, I see they make an interesting point about the latest surge by the Illini:

“Since moving Will Krug into the leadoff spot vs. Ohio on Feb. 22, the Illini have won six of their last seven games. As the first two hitters in the lineup, Krug and Michael Hurwitz are leading the Illini with nine runs scored over that 6-1 stretch.”

I predicted back in January that Krug would be a key player for Illinois this year (based partially on his 2012 summer league performance).  I questioned that prediction a bit when I didn’t see his name mentioned a whole lot in the preseason press releases.  I feel vindicated now and more importantly I’m glad for the Illini.

I didn’t see Michael Hurwitz’ offense developing the way that it has, though.  Wow! Between the two of them it makes such a difference to have someone on base when the Parr brothers come to bat.

In other news, good luck to former Illini Chris Robinson on Friday.  He’ll be starting for Team Canada against Italy in their first game of the World Baseball Classic.

I’m enjoying writing about Illini Baseball for Smile Politely, even more so when they’re winning.

Good luck this weekend, Illini!!