It is a critical weekend for Purdue baseball. After dropping two of three at Penn State Purdue finds itself on the outside looking in at the Big Ten Tournament. There are four weekend series (12 games) left in the conference season and Purdue sits at 6-12. The sweeps at the hands of UCLA and Washington loom large, as the top 12 twams make the postseason tourney in Omaha. The Boilermakers are a game behind Minnesota, Rutgers, and Nebraska, who are all tied for 12th place. The good news there is that Purdue has the tiebreakers with series wins over Rutgers and Minnesota, plus it still has to play Nebraska the final weekend of the season.

Purdue still needs wins though, and of late the pitching has been a disappointment. The Boilers were tagged for 16 runs this weekend in a midweek 16-10 loss to a very good Austin Peay team. Penn State also hit double digits in runs in both of their wins on Friday and Saturday last week.

This weeken Purdue heads over to Illinois in search of victories.

Purdue (24-16, 6-12 Big Ten) at Illinois (23-15, 10-8 Big Ten)

Friday, April 25 to Sunday, April 27 / Stream B1G+

Series Opener: Friday, April 25 at 7 p.m. ET

Middle Game: Saturday, April 26 at 4 p.m. ET

Series Finale: Sunday, April 27 at 2 p.m. ET

Illinois Field / Champaign, Illinois

PROBABLE PITCHING MATCHUPS

Friday: Carter Doorn (Sr, RHP) vs. ILL's Tyler Schmitt (Jr, RHP)

Saturday: Cole Van Assen (So, RHP) vs. ILL's Regan Hall (So, LHP)

Sunday: TBA for Both Teams

Illinois is the defending Big Ten champion and an NCAA team from a year ago. They are currently in a jumble of teams in the middle of the Big Ten at 10-8, and they are four games behind league leading Iowa. Last week they dropped two of three at Washington, but they took a series from Indiana the week before.

Illinois is one of the best hitting teams in the conference with a team average over .300. Their pitching has been a little suspect, however, as they have a team ERA over six.

Purdue has been up and down in weekend series of late. Two weeks ago Doorn and Van Assen had excellent outings to take wins over Rutgers. Last week both were roughed up a bit after the offense gave them an early lead. Purdue did recover to win the Sunday game, but the last four games turned into slugfests where Purdue ended up on the short end three times.

Ultimately, that is what it comes down to. If the pitching can hold up Purdue's offense is strong enough to win most games. Unfortuantely, the pitching staff has given up 10 runs or more 10 times this season, and Purdue is 0-10 in such gmes.

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