The Indiana Hoosiers (22-6, 4-2) hosted the IU Indy Jaguars (3-23) on Wednesday at Andy Mohr Field in Bloomington. With the Jaguars riding a 20-game losing streak coming into this game, IU may have been caught looking ahead to the weekend series at Maryland. The Hoosiers came back from an early deficit to win 6-3 in a game filled with errors and missed opportunities to put the game out of reach.
The Hoosiers fell behind 2-0 early as starting pitcher Aubree Hooks allowed two runs on two hits and two walks. All four batters she faced reached base. Hooks was yanked without recording an out in favor of Brooke Mannon who went 5.1 innings. Mannon gave up one unearned run on a hit and two walks as she struck out five batters.
Indiana would get a run back in the bottom of the first as a Josie Bird ground ball was mishandled allowing Aly VanBrandt to score. The two teams traded zeros in the second before IU took the lead for good in the bottom of the third inning.
A one-out Bird single started the offensive flurry for the Hoosiers. Jada Ellison entered as a pinch runner for Bird and immediately had an impact stealing second base and then scoring on a Madalyn Strader single to tie the game at two. Ellie Goins followed with a double that just snuck inside the third base bag to score Strader. Alli Gavin closed out the scoring in the third with a long two-run home run to left field to give IU a 5-2 lead.
IU Indy would take advantage of more Indiana mistakes in the top of the fourth as they cut into the Hoosier led scoring on a double steal. The Hoosiers made three errors on the day leading to two unearned runs. IU pitching also walked five batters and threw only 75 strikes on 129 pitches.
Ella Troutt pitched a scoreless final 1.2 innings and the Hoosiers added an insurance run in the bottom of the sixth on a double steal attempt as Navaeh Nash scored as VanBrandt got into a run down between second and first.
IU will head to Maryland for a three-game weekend series starting on Friday.