Already behind the eight-ball after an 0-4 start to their season, the Husker baseball team will have to make due without one of their top bats for this weekend’s series at Texas. Michael Pritchard, Nebraska’s preseason All-American DH, will not travel with the team after suffering an oblique strain. Pritchard went 1-7 at the plate in two games last weekend, missing two games due to the injury. There’s also a chance Pritchard could miss the team’s series in New Mexico as well.
Colorado Rockies pitcher Jhoulys Chacin hopes he can use the World Baseball Classic to get a jumpstart on a comeback season. Chacin plans to represent his home nation of Venezuela in the 16-nation tournament which begins March 1. The 25 year-old right-hander missed over three months of the 2012 season due to injury but is being counted on to front the Rockies rotation this season. Chacin will join Rockies teammates Carlos Gonzalez and Ramon Hernandez on Team Venezuela.
The action cranks up in the boys basketball subdistricts tonight. At the C2-11 subdistrict in McCook, the St. Pat’s Irish and Hershey Panthers renew their rivalry in the first round, with the Irish looking to move towards a third straight state appearance. ESPN Radio 1410 will have the action, with pregame coverage at 5:45 and the tip-off at 6. St. Pat’s isn’t the only Lincoln County team to be a top seed. Wallace has the number one spot in the D2-10 subdistrict. They play Hayes Center tonight in Cambridge. The Brady Eagles face Anselmo-Merna in the first round of the D2-9 subdistrict in Gothenburg. And after a win over Sutherland last night, Maxwell gets a crack at undefeated Paxton in the D1-11 subdistrict.
The class A girls basketball districts open tonight as well. The North Platte Lady Bulldogs take on Kearney at Millard West High School in round one of the A-2 district. The game will tip off at 7:15, following the Millard West-Omaha Bryan game.
The Bulldog boys will host the Class A-6 district. They’ll take on Papio South on 5:30 on Saturday, with a game between Omaha North and Omaha Bryan to follow. The A-6 championship game will be held Tuesday.
A seven-game winning streak has gotten the Husker women’s basketball team back into the AP Top 25 poll. The Huskers check in at number 24 in this week’s rankings. Nebraska was ranked 18th in the season opening AP poll, but fell out of the rankings just after the start of the new year. But their hot streak and 19-6 overall record has earned them a return to the rankings. Nebraska is the third Big Ten team in the to 25, behind number seven Penn State and number 22 Purdue. The Huskers visit the Michigan Wolverines Thursday night.
After a four-day hiatus for the All-Star Break, the Denver Nuggets will be hoping to start the second half of the NBA season on a high note. They host the Boston Celtics at Pepsi Center. A triple-overtime loss to the Celtics nine days ago started a three-game losing skid for the Nuggets leading into the Break. The Nuggets begin the second half in fifth place in the Western Conference, two and a half games behind Memphis. Tipoff tonight in Denver is set for 8 PM.
Nebraska freshman pitcher Kayla Workman was named the Big Ten’s Freshman of the Week. Workman pitched seventeen innings over three games last weekend and allowed just one earned run. She hurled the first no-hitter by a Husker freshman in a decade with a six-inning gem against Utah State. The Corona, California native is the first Husker to ever be named Freshman of the Week by the Big Ten. The Huskers play five games in Cathedral City, California this weekend.
More former Colorado Rockies are joining the ballclub this spring in instructional roles with the organization. Eric Young and Pedro Astacio were hired yesterday as guest instructors. Young played for the Rockies from 1993 to 1997. He’ll work with position players on basestealing and bunting. Astacio, who ironically was acquired in a trade for Young and pitched in Denver from 1997 to 2001, will work with the pitchers.
Four losses in the season’s opening weekend have the Husker baseball team off to their worst start in nearly two decades. Nebraska concluded their disappointing weekend out West with a walk-off 4-3 loss to USC in Los Angeles Sunday afternoon. Closer Dylan Vogt allowed two runs in the bottom of the ninth to let the game slip away. Previously, the Huskers dropped a pair of games to 22nd-ranked Cal State-Fullerton on Saturday, and lost their first game of the weekend to Cal State-Bakersfield on Friday night. The Big Red are in Austin, Texas this coming weekend for a three-game series with the Longhorns.
The Husker softball team’s fine start to their season continued with four wins in five games at the Hillenbrand Invitational in Tucson, Arizona over the weekend. Nebraska lost to 16th-ranked Arizona, and beat Southern Utah, Utah State, Drake, and Purdue. The highlight of the weekend was freshman pitcher Kayla Workman’s six-inning no-hitter in the 9-0 defeat of Utah State on Saturday afternoon. The Huskers play at the Mary Nutter College Classic in Cathedral City, California this weekend.
It won’t be made official by the NSAA until Tuesday, but it appears that the North Platte Bulldogs boys basketball team will be hosting a Class A district as one of the top seven teams in the class in the Wild Card standings. As of Sunday night the Dawgs sat sixth in Wild Card points. They would host a district that would bring Omaha North, Omaha Bryan and Papillion-La Vista South to the Dawghouse. First round play in the boys Class A districts begins on Saturday.
Boys basketball subdistrict play in the C and D classes begins tonight with the play-in games in subdistricts with five teams. The Maxwell Wildcats and Sutherland Sailors will face each other in the D1-11 subdistrict play-in game tonight at 7 PM at the McGahan Activities Center in North Platte. Sutherland, the fourth seed, won both regular season meetings against Maxwell. The winner of this one gets the unenviable task of facing unbeaten Paxton on Tuesday night.
