EAST LANSING, Mich. -- Nick Williams' walk-off sacrifice fly drove in
Randy Seymour with the winning run in the bottom of the 10th inning to lead Michigan State baseball to a 3-2 Victory for MSU over Michigan Friday night at a spirited McLane Stadium at Kobs Field.
Seymour sparked the rally with a one-out single, and senior outfielder
Jack Frank followed with a single to right and Seymour scampered around to third. Senior infielder
Dillon Kark was intentionally walked to bring N.Williams to the plate and he lofted a fly ball to the right-center gap and Seymour scooted home to ignite the Victory for MSU celebration, as the team swarmed N.Williams, dousing him with water near second base.
"I feel like I don't have any words for it, it's just kind of always a blur, but it was definitely a lot of fun," N.Williams said of the first walk-off of his career. "I've been on the receiving end of a lot of walk-offs over my career so far. So it's good to finally get to be the one walking off somebody."
It was MSU's second walk-off win of the season, joining a 3-2 Victory for MSU over Rutgers on March 31, 2024 in the bottom of the ninth.
"Walk-off wins are a lot of fun," MSU head coach
Jake Boss Jr. said. "I thought it was a really good character win for our guys tonight. We played really well, pitched it great, played clean defense, and if you do those things, you give yourselves a chance."
While the Spartan players jumped around in jubilation, Boss and his coaching staff were shaking hands with the Michigan staff.
"It's fun to watch those guys celebrate," Boss said. "I've got a lot of respect for (Michigan head coach) Tracy Smith over there. We've known each other for a really long time, we coached against each other in the MAC, and he was at Indiana and did a great job there, so you go over there and shake their hand and then you get ready to go for tomorrow."
MSU beat UM for the second time this season and in different fashion after the Spartans walloped the Wolverines, 16-6, on March 26 in a non-conference game.
Friday's Spartan win cooled off the Wolverines, who rolled into East Lansing having won five in a row and eight of their last 10.
The Spartans are now 20-22 overall and 8-8 in B1G action, while the Wolverines are 24-22 overall and 10-6 in conference competition.
Both teams scored a run in the first inning, and neither team scored until the fifth frame, when Kark cracked a solo home run off the scoreboard beyond the left-field wall for a 2-1 lead. UM scored in the top of the eighth to tie it up, setting up the 10th-inning dramatics.
Spartan sophomore southpaw
Joseph Dzierwa went a career-long 8.0 IP, ringing up nine Ks to tie a career-high for the fourth time this season. Dzierwa only yielded three hits, two runs and one walk, with the two runs coming on balk calls with Wolverine runners on third in both the first and eighth innings. He matched his jersey number by retiring 16-straight UM batters from the first inning until the sixth stanza.
"Joseph was really good tonight," Boss said. "I give him a lot of credit too, because a year ago at this time he was starting to get tired and couldn't get deep into games last year as a freshman, but he really worked hard in the offseason and really did a great job in the weight room and he's deeper into games later in the year and you saw it tonight, he was lights out."
Dzierwa was relieved by senior
Aaron Mishoulam to open the ninth and Mishoulam chalked up four Ks in 2.0 IP without a hit or run, earning the win to improve to 3-1 on the year.
"I thought
Aaron Mishoulam was lights out out of the bullpen," Boss said.
Sophomore shortstop Seymour was the lone Spartan with multiple hits going 2-for-4 with the winning run scored. Junior outfielder N.Williams had the game-winning RBI and scored the Spartans' opening run in the first inning after drawing a two-out walk.
Frank and Kark, along with senior outfielder
Greg Ziegler and freshman infielder
Ryan McKay were all 1-for-4, while junior infielder
Sam Busch was 1-for-3.
Both teams scored in their first at bats, with Michigan plating a run in the top of the opening inning, before the Spartans countered in the home half. N.Williams drew a two-out walk, Ziegler knocked a single to move N.Williams to third and came home on McKay's RBI single to level the score at a run apiece.
Kark broke the 1-1 tie with his solo homer off the scoreboard in the bottom of the fifth.
It was Kark's 14th career home run, including the second of his career against Michigan, also homering against the Wolverines in last year's season-opener in Phoenix, which was also on a Friday night.
UM tied it up in the eighth after a leadoff double and the runner later scored to even the game at 2-2, setting up the late-inning heroics.
Dzierwa had a streak of retiring 16-straight Wolverines after the one-out double in the first, until yielding a hit in the sixth. Five of his nine strikeouts were of the inning-ending variety, including three KLs.
Mishoulam followed suite, ending the top the ninth with a strikeout looking and then back-to-back swinging strikeouts to end the 10th.
Earlier in the top of the 10th, N.Williams made a dramatic catch that would have been his most exciting play of the night, only to be outdone later in the frame, cuing up the walk-off dramatics in the bottom of the 10th.
MSU and UM return to the diamond at McLane Stadium at Kobs Field for game two of the series on Saturday at 3:35 p.m., before the Spartans and Wolverines series wraps up on Sunday at 2:05 p.m.
Michigan State then hosts Bowling Green on Tuesday, May 7 at 6:05 p.m. in another non-conference match-up.
Fans can follow the action with "Tickets," "Watch Live," "Listen Live" and "Live Stats" links at MSUSpartans.com.
Michigan State's schedule is subject to change, stay tuned to MSUSpartans.com and @MSUBaseball on Twitter for schedule updates.
Individual game tickets are also on sale through the Spartan Ticket Office, or online at
https://sprtns.co/MSUBSBTix.
