March 4, 2006
Junior righthander Cole DeVries tossed six shutout innings while his teammates cashed in 11 hits for eight runs, as the host team Minnesota defeated Notre Dame, 8-0, in second-day Metrodome action at the Dairy Queen Classic. Saturday’s game marked the first shutout loss for the Irish since late in the 2002 season, a 215-game scoring streak that ranks second-longest in the program’s history.
Minnesota (1-4) manufactured three runs in the second inning – after three singles, a walk and a costly balk – before adding two in the fifth and three in the sixth. Shortstop Dan Lyons led the Gophers from the 2-spot, batting 2-for-4 with two RBI and a pair of runs scored.
Junior righthander Jeff Samardzija (1-1) suffered the loss, allowing five runs on six hits and two walks. DeVries (1-1) also evened his record after logging the six shutouts innings, with four hits allowed, two walks and three strikeouts.
Notre Dame (2-4) had 11 total baserunners but batted just 0-for-7 with runners on base.
Senior first baseman Matt Bransfield nearly left the park leading off the fourth inning, after driving a full-count pitch that kicked off the top of the fence in deep left-center for a standup double. DeVries then kept the runner stranded with a pair of strikeouts and a harmless tapper back to the mound that ended the threat.
Senior shortstop Greg Lopez was the only Irish player with multiple hits, batting 2-for-3 from the 8th spot in the lineup.
Notre Dame allowed four leadoff batters to reach and three of them going on to score. The Irish now have allowed more than 50-percent of leadoff batters to reach (27-of-52), with 15 of them coming around to score (including 9-of-10 at the DQ Classic).
Prior to Saturday’s loss, a 11-0 defeat at the hands of Rutgers on May 5, 2002, had been all that stood between the Irish and what would have been a 447-game scoring streak (which would have ranked second-longest in NCAA history). That loss to Rutgers ended Notre Dame’s school-record scoring streak at 231 games but the Irish then rattled off the 215-game scoring streak that ended in the shutout versus Minnesota.
Notre Dame now has been shut out just seven times in the 12-year Paul Mainieri era, spanning 692 games (roughly one shutout loss per 100 games).
The Irish now have started 0-2 at a regular-season tournament just five times in the Mainieri era – but twice at the Metrodome (’03 and ’06) – spanning 32 regular-season tournaments. Notre Dame never has gone 0-2 in a Mainieri-era postseason tournament, including 11 conference tournaments, eight NCAA regionals, the 2002 Super Regional and the ’02 College World Series.
Notre Dame (2-4) 0-0-0 0-0-0 0-0-0 – 0 7 1
Minnesota (1-4) 0-3-0 0-2-3 0-0-X – 8 11 1
Jeff Samardzija (L, 1-1), Wade Korpi (5), Mike Dury (6), Sam Elam (8) and Sean Gaston, Cody Rizzo (6).
Cole DeVries (1-1), Bill Johnson and John Arlt, Jeff DeSmidt (8).
Doubles: Matt Bransfield (ND), Dan Lyons (MN), Mike Mee (MN) and Nate Hanson (MN).