While most Ohio State students are enjoying their summer off, some premier Buckeye student-athletes are still engaged in the heat of competition. The baseball team needed to win the Big Ten Tournament in order to make it the NCAA Tourney, and it did just that — becoming the lowest seed to ever win the tourney. What follows are recaps of the baseball team’s run and the track and field team’s NCAA preliminaries with links to the press releases.
Track and Field (Men’s and Women’s)
The Ohio State track and field team competed in the 2019 Division I Outdoor Preliminaries hosted by the University of North Florida. Against tough competition, the Scarlet and Gray qualified for the NCAA Championships in 16 events.
Championship Qualifiers
- DaJuan Seward – Long Jump – 7.51 (PR)
- Sade Olatoye – Hammer Throw – 65.95m | Shot Put – 17.53m
- Tyler Johnson – 400m – 45.79s
- Sara McKeeman – Pole Vault – 4.07m (PR)
- Chance Ehrnsberger – Shot Put – 19.11m (PR)
- Women’s 4×100 (Bliss Soleyn, Anavia Battle, Karimah Senior and Taylor DeLoach)- 43.92
- Cody Stine – High Jump – 2.19m
- Julia Rizk – 1500m – 4:16.49s
- Adelaide Aquilla – Shot Put – 16.34m
- Morgan Lewis – 100 Hurdles – 13.23s
- Anavia Battle – 200m – 22.73s
- Nick Gray – 200m – 20.14s
- Abby Nichols – 5000m – 16:13.59s
- Luke Landis – 5000m – 14:15.65s
- Men’s 4x400m Relay (Tavonte Mott, Nick Gray, Asa Burke, Tyler Johnson) – 3:06.16s
Baseball
The No. 7-seeded Ohio State baseball team held No. 2-seeded Michigan to just one hit and rallied to a 2-1 victory in the opening round of the 2019 Big Ten Tournament at TD Ameritrade Park in Omaha, Neb. S
Sophomore catcher Dillon Dingler delivered on a go-ahead RBI single in the eighth inning.
Freshman right-handed pitcher Will Pfennig earned the win after tossing 1⅔ scoreless innings of relief, while redshirt sophomore left-handed reliever Andrew Magno claimed save No. 11 of the season with two scoreless innings of work.
“We fought hard and there was a lot of baseball that was left on the field but our guys competed,” head coach Greg Beals. “You knew by about the third inning that it was going to be one of those games where every base counts. Give our guys credit, I thought our pitchers did a great job. We walked too many hitters but were able to get some big strikeouts. We limited them to just one hit and defensively played strong, especially from the left side of the diamond. Lonsway was pitching off short rest with the situation that we are in but got us deep in the ball game. Will Pfennig put up five quality outs for us and once we took the lead it was time for Andrew Magno to come into the game. It’s a big win to stay on the positive side of the bracket.”
Due to severe weather May 23 in Omaha, the No. 7-seeded Ohio State and No. 6-seeded Maryland Big Ten Tournament second round matchup was suspended with the Buckeyes leading, 3-2, in the bottom of the eighth.
Ohio State scored first on an RBI single by senior left fielder Brady Cherry, plating junior right fielder Dominic Canzone in the first inning. Then in the third, Canzone scored on a throwing error, giving the Buckeyes a 2-0 advantage.
Maryland’s Maxwell Costes tied the game up with one swing of the bat on a two-run homer to left in the bottom of the third.
Freshman shortstop Zach Dezenzo regained the lead for Ohio State with a sacrifice fly to center field, scoring Cherry in the top of the eighth.
Ohio State left-handed starting pitcher Griffan Smith excelled on the hill, limiting the Terrapins to two runs on five hits and three walks, while tying his career-high 10 strikeouts across seven innings.
Magno relieved Smith to begin the bottom of the eighth. Play was suspended due to severe weather at 11:06 p.m. E.T. with one out and a Maryland runner on second base.
Magno took the mound for the Buckeyes when play resumed the morning of May 24 and recorded the five outs necessary to advance to the semifinals with a 3-2 win.
“The one thing that I’m really proud of is our guys required no coaching last night or this morning as far as dealing with a rain out and having to come back,” Beals said. “They handled it well in an odd situation with how the ball game played out. I’m proud of their resilience. They came out this morning and answered the bell.”
No. 7-seeded Ohio State fell, 9-6, against No. 4-seeded Minnesota in the semifinals of the 2019 Big Ten Tournament.
Minnesota starting pitcher Max Meyer limited the Buckeyes to zero runs on three hits with seven strikeouts and no walks in 5⅔ innings.
Pfennig, a Mason, Ohio, native, worked a career-high 7⅓ innings, allowing four runs on seven hits and three walks with four strikeouts.
The Buckeyes rallied to cut the Golden Gopher lead to two in the eighth, highlighted by a bases-clearing double from Brent Todys in a four-run inning. However, Minnesota scored three runs off the Buckeye bullpen in the ninth on a bases-clearing triple by Jack Wassel.
Dillon Dingler blasted a two-run homer in the bottom of the ninth in a three-hit performance, but it wasn’t enough.
Ohio State jumped out to a seven-run lead and held off a late Minnesota comeback effort to win, 8-6, in the semifinals of the Big Ten Tournament.
The Scarlet and Gray scored four runs in the fourth, two in the fifth and two in the sixth. Dingler put together a three-hit game with a stolen base and walk, while Cherry launched a homer and a double with two RBI.
On short rest, left-handed starting pitcher Seth Lonsway gave the Buckeyes five strong innings and limited Minnesota to one run on four hits and one walk with six strikeouts.
Magno claimed save No. 13 of the season with 2⅓ scoreless innings with one walk and one strikeout.
Following the victory against Minnesota, Ohio State took on Nebraska in the championship game, where the Buckeyes prevailed, 3-1, in front of an electric pro-Husker crowd of 17,503 fans May 26.
Off short rest, sophomore left-handed pitcher Griffan Smith shined on the mound in the championship game, pitching 5 ⅔ innings and limiting Nebraska to one unearned run on two hits and four walks with six strikeouts.
Magno relieved Smith in the sixth and the lefty shut the door on the Cornhuskers, recording his fourth save of the week to seal the Big Ten Tournament title for the Buckeyes. He tossed 3⅓ scoreless innings, allowing two hits and two walks with four strikeouts. Magno claimed an astonishing four saves on the week.
Cherry gave the Scarlet and Gray an early 1-0 lead with a one-out single off Nebraska starting pitcher Matt Waldron to plate Canzone in the bottom of the first.
Ohio State scored its second run on a close call at the plate when a call at a play at the plate was overturned in the fourth. Husker catcher Luke Roskam missed the tag on a sliding Todys at the dish on a sac fly by freshman third baseman Nick Erwin.
Nebraska threatened to score in the seventh with two in scoring position against Magno, but Erwin fielded a slow roller down the third base line and fired across the diamond to a stretched Conner Pohl to end the inning. The play was reviewed and stood as called on the field as an out.
Junior first baseman Conner Pohl added an insurance run in the bottom of the eighth with a sac fly as the Buckeyes prevailed as the lowest seed to ever win the Big Ten tourney.
