Nebraska wins its first Big Ten baseball tournament championship (2024)

The crowd rose to its feet, sensing the moment. Anticipating that something special was about to happen.

Gabe Swansen – as he has all week at the Big Ten tournament – delivered.

The Nebraska outfielder hammered a full-count hanging slider to the wall in left-center for the go-ahead run in the ninth inning and the Huskers completed an improbable week-long rally to beat Penn State 2-1 and capture their first-ever B1G tourney championship Sunday afternoon at Schwab Field.

Everyone, it seemed, felt what was coming, except the red-hot batter at the plate who outpaced his entire season of statistics in a few unforgettable days. Swansen – always even keel – just wanted to put the ball in play with two strikes, two outs and a runner on second base.

NU coach Will Bolt stood on the top step of the first-base dugout trying to keep a slow heartbeat. Veteran reliever Kyle Perry had flashbacks to pressure situations from postseasons past. Catcher Josh Caron banged the padded dugout railing convinced of what his teammate was going to do.

“It gave me goosebumps,” said Jackson Brockett, who fired eight stellar innings to set up the finish. “I’ve got goosebumps talking about it right now. The stadium just erupted. I’ve never experienced anything like that.”

The difference-making sequence came late in the game, just after noon, after the start time was moved up because of forecasted inclement weather that never came. First a two-out Ben Columbus single to center on a center-cut fastball, then a stolen base by pinch runner Cayden Brumbaugh confirmed by video replay.

Swansen’s double on the eighth pitch he saw provided the eventual winner and sends Nebraska into the NCAA tournament next week with a busload – or maybe plane load – of momentum.

“It just gives us a big motivation boost going forward,” Swansen said. “It gives us a lot of confidence knowing we can do it. And obviously it showed that we have the pitching depth to do it too.”

Ace Brett Sears came on for a 1-2-3 ninth to secure the save – the final out, fittingly, went to Swansen in left field – and the Huskers’ fifth straight elimination win in Omaha. Players dogpiled on the mound amid a decibel on par with a College World Series clincher from a sun-splashed, red-clad crowd of 13,300.

Sears had unsuccessfully petitioned to throw during Saturday’s doubleheader. Coaches told the 24-year-old the only way he would see the mound Sunday was if Nebraska needed one inning for the title.

“This is why I came back,” said Sears, who could have pursued pro ball last summer but instead transformed from a so-so reliever into the Big Ten Pitcher of the Year. “This is what I came back for.”

Second-seeded Nebraska (39-20) hadn’t claimed a conference postseason event since 2005 in the Big 12. It lost in the finals in Omaha in 2014 and 2019, just missing on the core memories of finishing. This time it denied eighth-seeded Penn State (29-24), snapping the Nittany Lions’ seven-game league win streak one victory shy of its first NCAA regional in 24 years.

“I’m happy Nebraska was in it because we wouldn’t have wanted to dogpile in front of nobody,” PSU outfielder Adam Cecere said. “Blessed with opportunity.”

A tournament that technically had no bearing on Nebraska’s standing for the NCAA tournament – it will be a regional two seed somewhere next weekend, with the bracket reveal Monday morning – reached an emotional crescendo for the Huskers after the final out Sunday. Players dumped Gatorade on Bolt, with the coach raising his arms and grinning. Players donned white championship hats and gray championship T-shirts.

“O Street’s calling!” one Husker yelled. Another kissed his girlfriend by the first-base dugout. Two did mock interviews with each other. Former team trainer Jerry Weber exchanged hugs with many.

Bolt and team play-by-play radio broadcaster Greg Sharpe – who continues to undergo chemotherapy in his battle with cancer and called Sunday’s contest – shared a long embrace on the grass. Fans lined the edge of the field to offer high-fives and seek autographs in a scene reminiscent of Nebraska baseball glory moments past.

“After tough seasons like last year and the year before you get left with such an unfulfilling feeling,” Perry said while wiping tears from his eyes. “This is all worth it. This is 100% why I came back, to dogpile again. I’m crying like I’m sad but I’m the happiest man on earth right now.”

A pitchers’ duel was the feature item for Sunday brunch baseball. The early exception happened in the first inning as Penn State loaded the bases with a walk and two soft singles against Brockett. With two outs, the Nebraska left-hander threw low on a pickoff try to second base and the ball leaked into center field as Penn State’s Joe Jaconski trotted home.

But Brockett – who authored the program’s first nine-inning no-hitter in 70 years barely three weeks ago – had his best stuff from there. He retired the next 14 Nittany Lions, missing bats with a lively slider and inducing plenty of weak contact. Adam Cecere pulled a breaker into the right-field corner for a sixth-inning double to end the streak but Brockett responded by coaxing two more quick groundouts and followed with a 1-2-3 seventh and eighth.

“I knew if I went out there and gave my defense a shot, gave my hitters a shot, I knew they’d pull through,” Brockett said. “Just let it go and let my defense take care of me – and they did, all game long.”

Penn State ace Travis Luensmann kept a robust partisan crowd waiting nervously much of the morning. The 6-foot-6, 234-pounder picked up five strikeouts during a perfect first round through the Husker lineup.

NU hitters met briefly in the dugout before the fourth and produced an early threat when Joshua Overbeek reached on a bobbled chopper to the second baseman and Case Sanderson dropped a single into left on a hit and run. But a popup and double play on a bunt – Luensmann ran forward to grab a Columbus sacrifice try and doubled off Overbeek at third – erased the threat.

Caron finally set off the crowd – Nebraska was the “visitor” in designation only – with a game-tying smash leading off the seventh. The junior catcher slugged a 2-1 92-mph outside fastball the other way and out to right-center on a shot clearing 403 feet. The homer was Caron’s sixth of the week, setting a new Big Ten tournament record and squaring the scoreboard 1-1.

Caron was voted the event’s Most Outstanding Player while second baseman Rhett Stokes, pitcher Will Walsh and Swansen also landed on the all-tournament team.

“We were at a fork in the road this week,” Caron said. “Just how we came together and responded, we’re so tough as a group. Every one of these guys up and down the lineup contributed in some way. And I’m just so proud.”

Nebraska got five straight dazzling outings from Sears, Mason McConnaughey, Walsh, Drew Christo and Brockett to finish the event. Husker hurlers were dominant throughout – remove two bad innings in the Ohio State loss and NU allowed 12 earned runs in 50 tournament innings (2.16 ERA).

“A lot of memories come flooding back of being part of dogpiles as a player, winning championships as a coach,” Bolt said. “I’m not sure I’ve ever been around a group of young men quite like these and just how absolutely resilient they are.”

Nebraska doesn’t want to stop playing and it won’t have to for long. It will watch Monday’s selection show and prepare for at least one more week together.

The dogpile – a celebration of Championship Sunday gone right – isn’t the end.

“This was a story I’ll tell for a long time,” Bolt said. “But the story, the book, is not done being written this year. I’m thrilled with this championship and ready for more.”