Despite a rainy Saturday afternoon in Indiana, Maryland’s bats were on fire against Hoosier pitching. The Terps mashed two grand slams as part of an offensive explosion in a 17-4 run-rule win against Indiana (21-18, 11-9 Big Ten) at Bart Kaufman Field.

The skies opened up at the start of the second inning, and so did the Terps’ (18-22, 5-12 Big Ten) offense. 

Chris Hacopian led off the inning with a single up the middle. Then, Hollis Porter followed suit with another base hit, setting up Alex Calarco to drive in Hacopian with the third consecutive base-knock to start the inning.

After Paul Jones II was hit on the foot, Elijah Lambros stepped up to the plate with the bases loaded as the rain progressively fell harder. However, Lambros cut through the damp skies to send a pitch over the left field wall for a grand slam. 

An Eddie Hacopian sacrifice fly later in the frame ended the Terps’ second-inning scoring at six runs.

That second-inning outburst was enough to knock Indiana starter Cole Gilley out of the game. Indiana’s best statistical starter turned in his worst outing of the season, giving up five earned runs through just two innings, on 51 pitches thrown — 37 of those coming in the second.

The Maryland scoring continued with redshirt junior Grant Holderfield on in relief for the Hoosiers. 

After three consecutive Terps reached base, Brayden Martin drew a walk to bring in another run and keep the bases juiced. Then, Jacob Orr completely blew the game open. Batting out of the two-spot, the senior blasted his own grand slam on a letter-high offering, extending the Terps’ lead to 11-1.

After another Hoosier pitching change and with the rain continuing to pour, Calarco tacked on three more runs in the inning on a three-run blast into the trees beyond the center field fence. 

Despite steady rain for the previous inning and a half, the Indiana grounds crew finally decided to bring out the tarps with Maryland leading by 13.

Despite the 40-50 minute delay, Maryland starter Joey McMannis came back out to pitch the bottom of the third. After giving up a home run to Devin Taylor — the unceremonious blast ironically made him Indiana’s all-time leader in career home runs — Maryland’s bullpen began to stir, and it looked like McMannis would be on a short leash. 

But the sophomore righty quickly regained his momentum, retiring the next three Hoosier batters to end the third inning. That momentum continued into the next few frames, as McMannis later finished with his longest outing of the season, pitching five innings while only allowing three hits and two earned runs, both via the long ball.

Lambros’ productive day extended well beyond his second-inning slam, too. 

The senior struck again in the sixth inning, hitting a leadoff solo shot to tack on a 16th Maryland run. He also worked a walk as part of the eight-run third and laced a double in the fourth, which turned into Maryland’s sole run of the frame.

Chris Hacopian followed in Lambros’ footsteps, launching his own leadoff solo home run in the top of the seventh — Hacopian’s first homer since the UCLA series in early March. The sophomore’s solo shot capped Maryland’s scoring at 17. 

Ryan Van Buren would then close things out for the Terps in the bottom of the frame, securing the run-rule win.

With the Terps’ Saturday victory, the weekend series against Indiana is now knotted up at one apiece. Maryland has the chance to win its first Big Ten series of the season as the Terps take on the Hoosiers one more time on Sunday at 1 p.m. 

Nate Schwartz will be back on the call for the rubber match for MBN.