No. 20 Nebraska baseball coach Will Bolt challenged his team following its 10-5 loss to Illinois in Champaign Friday night, and the result was as he intended. The Huskers won the next two games to take the series.
“They didn’t really have each other’s backs is how they played on Friday,” Bolt said on the Huskers Radio Network. “We didn’t play the type of baseball that is the hallmark of Husker baseball, for one, especially the 2026 Huskers. But to win on the road is a big job, and we did it together.”
And they did it in different ways. Nebraska won a slugfest Saturday, 12-5, then won a pitchers’ duel Sunday, 3-0. Gavin Blachowicz and Ty Horn combined for the shutout, Blachowicz allowing six hits in 6.1 innings, striking out four and walking one to earn the victory. Horn earned the save, with 2.2 hitless innings, retiring the final eight in order, striking out two with no walks.
Blachowicz, now 4-1, “did a fantastic job,” said Bolt, then Horn “gave ‘em no hope at all out of the pen. He just pounded the strike zone.” The save was Horn’s first, after moving from the Friday starter role to the bullpen.
J’Shawn Unger, the closer, earned his ninth save Saturday, pitching 2.1 scoreless innings to preserve the victory for starter Carson Jasa, who went five innings, allowing three hits, two runs, one earned, striking out five but walking six. Tucker Timmerman pitched the other 1.2 innings, allowing three unearned runs. Jasa is now 8-1, tops on the team.
Footnote: Nebraska’s pitchers had a combined nine walks and four hit batters.
As for Friday, suffice it to say starter Cooper Katskee lasted only 2.2 innings, allowing six hits — two of them home runs — and seven runs, just two earned. Six of the runs came in the third inning for a 7-0 deficit. Nebraska cut it to 7-4 with a three-run sixth, but relievers Jaylen Worthley and Horn allowed a three-run bottom of the sixth. The loss was Katskee’s first after five wins.
Now for the hitting. Friday, the Huskers matched Illinois with 10 hits, but only two were for extra bases, doubles by Jeter Worthley and Jett Buck, who also had a single and drove in a run.
Saturday, Nebraska had a season-high 18 hits, 14 of them singles. Mac Moyer, Case Sanderson, Will Jesske and Joshua Overbeek each had three hits. Overbeek drove in three runs, Buck two.
Sunday, Sanderson was the only Husker with more than one of nine hits; he had two. Worthley hit his first home run as a Husker, a blast to left, more than 400 feet. And Moyer increased his on-base streak to 43 games, with a second-inning walk. He opened the ninth with a triple and would score the final run, for insurance, on a wild pitch. Illini pitchers walked only two, but starter Aiden Flinn hit four.
Nebraska, second in the Big Ten to UCLA and 20th-ranked nationally, is 33-11, including 17-4 in conference play. The Huskers are scheduled to play Kansas State in Lincoln Tuesday before a Big Ten series at Ohio State next weekend, as the regular season begins to wind down.
Friday night, “we didn’t play the hallmark of Husker baseball,” said Bolt.
But Saturday and Sunday Nebraska did, as the results show.
“We can win in a lot of different ways,” Bolt said.
That’s reflected, dramatically, in the final two games.
