LANSING, Mich. — Jack Frank’s two home runs boosted Michigan State baseball to a 12-2 (7 innings) run-rule Victory for MSU over Western Michigan Wednesday night in the “Capital Clash” at Jackson® Field™, home of the Lansing Lugnuts.
Frank, a senior outfielder, led off the bottom of the first with a solo home run to right field, then added another solo shot to lead off the sixth with a 431-foot homer to right center.
“It sounds like a lot of wind,” Frank said with a laugh about the distance of his home run. “It felt good. The funny thing about me is whenever I hit a ball well, I don’t really even remember the pitch. If somebody asked me the pitch I would say that I didn’t really know what it was. It just felt good and I would like to keep doing it. Like I’ve said before, you can’t live and die by it, but it was a good one.”
The Spartans pulled away from a 1-1 tie entering the bottom of the fifth by hanging six runs on the board in the home half of the fifth to open a 7-1 advantage. After WMU got within 7-2 in the top of the sixth, MSU added three more runs in the sixth and two more in the seventh, with the game ending due to the run-rule on an RBI sacrifice fly by freshman infielder Ryan McKay.
“I thought we had several really quality at bats tonight,” MSU head coach Jake Boss Jr. said. “We moved the ball with runners on base and in scoring position. Little things like that maybe don’t show up in the score book. These are all things we want to do and execute as far as our offense is concerned. All of that will lead to momentum, which we got today.”
Michigan State snapped Western Michigan’s eight-game win streak, as the Broncos brought the longest active win streak in the nation into Wednesday’s match-up, and the Spartans stopped the streak in smashing fashion.
MSU also swept the three meetings with WMU, with all three coming in minor league ballparks, with the first two match-ups at Fluor Field, home of the Greenville Drive, the A-affiliate of the Boston Red Sox, in Greenville, S.C.
The Spartans now have an eight-game win streak of their own, as they’ve beaten the Broncos in the last eight meetings as part of nine of the last 10, 10-of-12 and 18-of-21 in closing WMU’s overall series lead to 95-90. Wednesday was the seventh all-time meeting at Jackson Field and Michigan State leads 5-2 in meetings there.
MSU also snapped its five-game overall losing skein, moving to 15-19 overall. WMU is 20-14 with the loss.
“Last weekend was obviously a bad weekend. We did not do well last week. We were just looking for something positive to get us out of it,” Boss said. “I thought we had a good practice yesterday. We had a good meeting with our leaders yesterday and I thought coming from our leaders our guys were in a really good place. I felt good about today and they proved it.”
Frank was one of those leaders that stepped up in a big way Wednesday night.
“I think coming off of last weekend we just wanted to refocus and reset,” Frank said. “We wanted to get a little momentum. It was a tough weekend for us but we needed to put that behind us because we are still a good team. I think today was just another example of if we are going to be resilient, we are going to do what we do. Ultimately, good things happened today, but we played our style of baseball. More aggressive, not afraid to make mistakes, and I think those things are really what made the difference. Like I have said before, a personal good performance is just doing the same thing everyday. You can’t live and die by the results, which I sometimes do a bad job at. It was just another day and today was my day and some other guys had a great game too. So it was overall just a good day to turn it around and get ready for Penn State this weekend.”
Frank finished 3-for-5 with three runs scored and the two RBI from the pair of homers. Frank becomes the first Spartan to homer twice in the same game since former teammate Brock Vradenburg had two round-trippers vs. Northwestern last season on April 29, 2023.
Senior outfielder Greg Ziegler was 3-for-3 with two runs scored and an RBI, while junior designated hitter Christian Williams was 2-for-3 with three RBI and a run scored. McKay, senior catcher Sam Thompson and sophomore infielder Randy Seymour were all 2-for-4. Thompson had a run and an RBI, while Seymour scored a pair of runs and McKay had one RBI with the “walk-off” sac fly.
Senior infielder Dillon Kark was 1-for-3 with an RBI and a run scored, while junior outfielder Nick Williams was 1-for-4 with two ribbies and a run scored. Junior infielder Sam Busch scored a run after drawing a walk.
On the mound, senior Harrison Cook went 4.0 IP, scattering six hits with one run, ringing up a pair of punchouts to go with one walk, earning the win, his first of the season.
Sophomore Nolan Higgins (1.0 IP, 1 H, 1 BB), freshman Logan Pikur (1.0 IP, 2 H, 1 R) and freshman Gannon Grundman (1.0 IP, 0 H, 2 K) rounded out the action on the mound.
The Spartans got on the board in literally their first at bat, as Frank led off with a home run.
Frank’s leadoff HR in the first was MSU’s first leadoff HR since March 11, 2022 when Mitch Jebb hit a leadoff homer vs. Cincinnati, which also came at a minor league ballpark, doing so at Fluor Field in Greenville, S.C.
The Broncos broke through in the top of the fourth, with back-to-back extra-base hits after a triple by Dylan Nevar and an RBI double by Greg Budig.
MSU re-took the lead in the bottom of the fifth after a sac fly by Kark drove in Seymour, who led off with a single and moved to third on a Frank single, with Frank moving up to second on the throw. N.Williams followed with an RBI single to left to plate Frank. One WMU pitching change and two batters later, Ziegler knocked a double to left, and C.Williams followed by smacking a single to left to drive in N.Williams and Ziegler. Busch was intentionally walked, and Thompson made WMU pay with a single to center to plate C.Williams and Busch scored on two WMU errors on the play.
The Broncos closed to 7-2 in the top of the sixth on a leadoff double and an RBI single.
MSU got the run back and more, as Frank led off the home half of the sixth with his deep jack to right center. Kark was hit by a pitch, moved to second on a N.Williams groundout and to third on a McKay flyout, and scored on a Ziegler single up the middle. After Ziegler stole second, C.Williams drove him in with a double off the wall down the line in right for a 10-2 Spartan lead.
After the singing and stretching in the seventh, Thompson led off with an infield single and Seymour followed with a double down the left field line. Two batters later, Kark reached on another infield single to load the bases. N.Williams was up next and was hit by a pitch for an RBI, bringing Thompson in to score. McKay followed with a fly ball to deep right center for the “walk-off” sac fly for the Victory for MSU.
Michigan State returns home to McLane Stadium at Kobs Field for a B1G weekend series against Penn State in a three-game B1G series, Friday-Sunday, April 19-21. Friday’s opener is an 8:02 p.m. first pitch and will be nationally televised on Big Ten Network. Saturday’s game two is at 3:35 p.m. before the series finale on Sunday at 1:05 p.m.
Fans can follow this weekend’s action with “Tickets,” “Watch Live,” “Listen Live” and “Live Stats” links at MSUSpartans.com.
Michigan State’s schedule is subject to change, stay tuned to MSUSpartans.com and @MSUBaseball on Twitter for schedule updates.
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For the first time ever, Michigan State baseball fans have the ability to purchase season tickets.
Season tickets packages are on sale through the Spartan Ticket Office. The MSU baseball season ticket package, which includes 24 home games at McLane Stadium at Kobs Field, is available for $50.
All ticket levels for seniors, adults and children are the same price. Admission remains free for all Michigan State students by showing their MSU ID at the entry gate.
The 2024 Spartan baseball season includes Big Ten match-ups against Rutgers, Penn State and Nebraska, along with regional clashes with Central Michigan, Oakland and Notre Dame, in addition to giving fans admission to all three home games of baseball Rivalry Week against Michigan.
Individual game tickets are also on sale through the Spartan Ticket Office.
Fans can contact the Spartan Ticket Office at 517-355-1610 or by email at tickets@msu.edu for questions or more information. A direct link to purchase season tickets is here.