If you are a Maryland Terrapins baseball fan, the document below is of real importance to you. The Big Ten released the bracket for the 2015 conference Tournament and Maryland is the number four seed. Interestingly, the first team the Terps will play. the Michigan State Spartans, is one of the conference foes Maryland didn’t meet in the regular season’s unbalanced schedule. The Spartans are the fifth seed.
Last season at this time, the Terrapins were on a roll. Maryland sailed into their final ACC Tournament on the winds of a nine game winning streak. The Terps won two more en route to reaching their first NCAA Tournament in more than 40 years. This season, Maryland will limp into the Big Ten Tournament having dropped seven of their final 11 games.
The Terps ended their season by dropping two of three at Northwestern when they salvaged a one run win in Saturday’s season finale rallying for four runs in the bottom of the eighth to eke out a 4-3 win after dropping a pair of one run decisions Thursday and Friday. Entering the series, Northwestern was 6-17 in B1G play and even with a sweep could not have earned a spot in the conference tournament which takes only the top eight finishers.
A Blessing and a Curse
It’s possible to look at Maryland’s seed as either a blessing or a curse. Should the Terrapins win their opener against the Spartans, they will face the winner of the game between top seeded Illinois and eighth seeded Nebraska. The Illini have had a special season finishing 21-1 in conference and 45-6-1 overall.
Because the tournament is a double elimination format, the fourth seed guaranteed that Maryland would have to face the Illini at least once and possibly twice. However, Nebraska is the only team on Maryland’s side of the bracket that the Terps met in the regular season. The Terps swept the Huskers in a series played in College Park the first weekend in April and they may need to beat Nebraska to advance to the semifinals.
Had the Terps won one more game or swept the Widcats, they would have finished in outright possession of third place. This would have placed them in the other half of the bracket and put them in a position where they might not have had to play Illinois before the championship game. On the other hand, it would have given them a first round match-up with Indiana who swept the Terps in College Park just two weeks ago.
A Brief Detour
First, let’s congratulate head coach John Czefc the Terrapins for compiling a 36-20 regular season mark and surpassing the program record for most wins in a regular that they established last year when they won 34 on their way to the program’s first ever 40 win season.
Individually, a number of Terps had outstanding seasons with special notice going to junior catcher Kevin Martir for being named one of 20 semifinalists for the Johnny Bench Award, given to the nation’s top catcher, as announced Friday by the Greater Wichita Area Sports Commission. Martir enters the B1G Tournament as Maryland’s second leading hitter batting .327 for the season. He has 15 doubles, seven home runs and drove in 41.
Kudos also go to sophomore pitcher Mike Shawaryn, who has been named a semifinalist for the 2015 Dick Howser Award, given to the top player in collegiate baseball, the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association (NCBWA) announced Friday. Shawaryn’s 11 wins leads the Big Ten and his 1.68 ERA is third in in the conference. He also leads the conference with 115 strikeouts.
What it all means
Despite their record setting season, after failing to sweep Ohio State and dropping Tuesday’s game against Liberty, Maryland put themselves in a position where, had they swept Northwestern, one win in the B1G Tournament would have likely secured them a spot in the NCAA Tournament. Once the Terps dropped the first game and certainly when they lost the second, they left little doubt that their only likely path to the NCAA Tournament is to secure the conference’s automatic qualifying bid. One might argue that a pair of wins Illinois and reaching the championship game might be enough to get them a bid. And it might. But it might not.
The tournament begins with four games starting Wednesday afternoon at Target Field in Minneapolis. Maryland and Michigan State will play the final game of the day. The game is schedule to start at 9:00 p.m. local time or 10:00 p.m. Eastern. The tournament will continue with daily games through Sunday’s championship tilt.
You can see the full bracket by clicking on the link below:
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