UNI goes out a Corridor Classic winner

 CEDAR RAPIDS - It isn't much in the big picture. But at least they've got the final Corridor Classic.

The Northern Iowa Panthers scored eight runs in the eighth and ninth innings and rallied to beat Iowa, 9-3, last night before 1,953 fans at Memorial Stadium in the last NCAA Division I intra-state baseball game.

"In those last couple of innings, we just rallied around each other and said 'We're not going to lose this game. We can't lose this game,'" said UNI second baseman Gabe Schultz.

They didn't lose this game, bringing a collective smile to a team that hasn't had anything to be glib about.

As you know, UNI will drop baseball at the end of this season for financial reasons. It's difficult to play the game when you know your days as a program are numbered and you have no idea what your future holds.

With that in mind, maybe it's appropriate the Panthers (16-24) went out winners in the Classic. The teams split these six Corridor Classic games, with UNI winning for the first time in three years.

"This is the toughest situation I've ever been in in my life," said UNI junior catcher Jeff Taliaferro. "It's just extremely hard to come to the park and be 100 percent focused on a game. You've got everything else on your mind, where you're going (next year), the media. Everybody's eyes are on you. Everybody is just pressing to try and go out the right way. We want to go out winning, to prove the guys wrong who cut us."   

UNI scored twice in the seventh inning to tie this game at 3-3, then scored six unearned runs in the ninth. Iowa (14-26) committed three errors, including a groundball hit by Schultz with one out that Hawkeye first baseman T.J. Cataldo let get past him to score two go-ahead runs.

Northern Iowa outhit Iowa by a 9-5 margin. Panthers relief pitchers Scott Airey, Reggie Hochstedler and Carlos Pinedo (the winner) combined to throw seven innings of three-hit, one-run ball.

"It came down to them wanting it more," said Iowa third baseman Kevin Hoef. "We've been doing this all year, not finishing games."

"I don't know that this means anything, other than it feels good to win again and win the last time we play the Hawkeyes," said UNI Coach Rick Heller. "I'm happy for my players, happy for our alumni. It was a big game. You don't know how many e-mails I got this week from former players, Panther alumni. To win the Corridor Classic, in this atmosphere, I'm just really proud of our guys.

The first four batters reached for Iowa: a leadoff single by Dallas Burke, two hit batsmen and a bases-loaded walk from Nick Brown. But UNI starting pitcher Lucas O'Rear, also a member of the Panthers' Missouri Valley Conference championship basketball team, settled down and limited the damage to one run, striking out Cataldo and Sean Flanagan.

The third out came when Hoef attempted a straight steal of home and was out by at least five feet.

Northern Iowa tied it in the second on a two-out RBI single by Schultz, who came into the game hitting .200. He's the son of hugely successful Lansing Kee High School Coach Gene Schultz.

An RBI single by Brown gave Iowa the lead back in the third, 2-1. A two-out run-scoring hit by Hoef in the seventh provided the Hawkeyes an insurance run, but their defense was no insurance.

After Levi Ferguson's sacrifice fly sliced the lead to 3-2 in the bottom of the seventh, Iowa shortstop Chett Zeise fielded a routine two-out grounder but pulled first baseman Cataldo off the bag for a throwing error that loaded the bases. Zeise is subbing for injured all-Big Ten senior Justin Toole, who broke an arm in a game last weekend against Michigan State.

Former Cedar Rapids Jefferson prep Travis Bennett followed with a sharp grounder up the middle that Zeise made a diving stop of. But the shortstop had no play, with the tying run scoring on the infield hit.

In the UNI eighth, Kalvin Johnson hustled into second base leading off after Iowa second baseman Zach McCool had his grounder run up his arm and into short right-center field. With runners on second and third with one out, the ever-present Schultz hit a routine grounder to first, with Cataldo, playing in, booting it to allow two runs to score for UNI's first lead, 5-3.

Cataldo then dropped a two-out foul pop by Brett Douglas with the bases loaded for an error, leading to four more unearned Panthers runs.