Illinois Baseball Report » schedule

The 2012 Illinois Baseball poster unveiled plus a new app on the way?

The Baseball Zealot — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 04:11:14 +0000

The U of I Baseball program has unveiled the official poster for the 2012 season. If you can’t wait till opening home date to see it up close, they’ve uploaded here so you can take a gander.

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WCIA-News has an interesting story about a few undergraduate students working with a journalism professor to come out with an iOS and Android app that will “enhance” the experience of Illini sports fans. The first beneficiaries of the app will be fans of Illinois baseball as they will debut it at the first home game.

What will it do? Here is how Assistant Professor Charles Ledford describes the experience:

"What people will be able to do is using their smart phone, point it at a head shot of a player, the player will basically come to life. A player’s 30- to – 40 second bio would be triggered by the head shot, virtual world will be brought together with the physical world."

Ledford says the app would be free of charge.

Looking towards the 2012 season

The Baseball Zealot — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 14:11:14 +0000

Here in Champaign-Urbana, we’ve just had our first taste of winter. In the last couple of days, we’ve had high temps in the 20s with a nice blanket of snow on the ground. Up until this point, it was almost (college) baseball weather.

On the Fightingillini.com blog, Ben Taylor reminds us that it’s 36 days to opening day. He breaks down the exciting 2012 schedule for the Illini baseball team. Exciting because, well, I’ll let Ben tell you:

“But this year’s schedule is stacked with teams receiving quite a bit of preseason buzz, including a pair of teams ranked in the top 15 of Collegiate Baseball’s preseason poll and two more ranked in the top 30. The Illini start the season with their toughest slate in the four years of the Big Ten/Big East Challenge as they face preseason No. 11 St. John’s, No. 15 Louisville and Notre Dame on the season’s first weekend.”

And don’t forget, the Illini will be traveling to Lincoln for the first time ever to play the Cornhuskers. The good news? We hold a 3-0 lead on them in the games that they’ve played here.

Did I mention the opening day is almost a month away??

Illinois Baseball announces stiff schedule for 2012

The Baseball Zealot — Sat, 19 Nov 2011 14:46:42 +0000

Every man is like the company he is wont to keep.

Euripides (484-406 B.C.)

It’s a relevant quote considering the announcement three days ago of the 2012 Illini Baseball schedule. This is big news. Not just because the new schedule has come out so early. But also because of the stiff competition we’ll be facing in the coming year. The Illinois baseball team will face Oregon State, Connecticut, St. John’s and Coastal Carolina in 2012, all teams that made the NCAA Tournament this year.

This is what happens when you hit the big time. As a fan, I’m excited about it. With Illinois winning the Big Ten Tournament and getting as far as they did in the NCAA Regionals, they have something to prove. And it won’t hurt our RPI ranking, either.

One major difference this coming season: the boys will be playing at the Nike College Showcase tournament in Eugene, Oregon (yes, that’s when we take on Oregon State). That will take place on March 9-11. I don’t remember when we have (seriously) scheduled a game that far north that early (I’m not counting that February series at Illinois Field a year or two ago that was promptly cancelled due to cold). I’m hoping for warmer weather for this one.

Of course, Illinois has an early series against new Big Ten arrival Nebraska on March 23-25. That will be a road series to open the Big Ten season. From all reports, Darin Erstad’s Huskers have a tough squad.

You can download a printable schedule (pdf) from fightingillini.com.

Less than three months till opening day!!

2012 Big Ten/Big EAST Challenge schedule announced

The Baseball Zealot — Wed, 05 Oct 2011 02:39:28 +0000

The schedule for the 2012 Big East/Big Ten Challenge has been released. You can find it at http://www.bigtenbigeastbaseballchallenge.com/

Relevant to our interests, here are the Illinois games:

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 2012

1:00pm
Notre Dame at Illinois (Walter Fuller Complex – Field #1, St. Petersburg, FL)

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2012

4:00pm
Louisville at Illinois (Al Lang Field, St. Petersburg, FL)

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 2012

10:00am
Illinois at St. John’s (Jack Russell Stadium, Clearwater, FL)

Illini posts practice times, dates for Orange and Blue World Series.

The Baseball Zealot — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 22:03:00 +0000

Practice at Illinois Field has, of course, been going on for a few weeks now but fightingillini.com has posted a schedule of practice times for anyone who wants to stop by and watch the boys play.

The schedule includes the the official dates for the Orange and Blue World Series games.

Mon., Oct. 3 – 3:30 PM (Orange & Blue World Series Game 1)
Tues., Oct. 4 – 4 PM (Orange & Blue World Series Game 2)
Wed., Oct. 5 – 3:30 PM (Orange & Blue World Series Game 3)

Don’t miss the video interview of Willie Argo, either.

Study, practice for the Illini

The Baseball Zealot — Sat, 27 Aug 2011 13:28:35 +0000

As someone who works at the University of Illinois and lives four blocks from campus, I can tell you the atmosphere has really changed in the past week. U of I students have been back at classes for a week for the 2011 fall semester and campus is hustling! Good luck to the baseball team in their studies. Maybe I’m old school but that is why you’re here. Nag, nag.

That said, all work and no play makes Willie Argo a dull boy. SID Ben Taylor tells me that individual workouts have started and full team practice will begin towards the beginning of the month. I’m sure the guys are glad to get back in the swing of things. You can bet I’m planning to go out to Illinois Field this fall a few times and will have the photos to prove it.

Maybe don’t put this in your calendar quite yet since this is tentative but October 3-5 is slated for the Orange and Blue World Series. Once the date is finalized, I’ll let everyone know.

Illinois baseball scheduled to take on Nebraska first in 2012

The Baseball Zealot — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 22:57:16 +0000

According to the News-Gazette’s Jeff Huth, Illinois will be the first opponent of Big Ten newcomer Nebraska. We’ll see them next year and the exact date is already set. On March 23-25 Illinois will travel to Lincoln to play the Cornhuskers.

Not only will the Nebraska be new to the Big Ten but they’ll have a new head coach. Former MLB player Darin Erstad has taken the reins for the ‘Huskers. Erstad has been the volunteer assistant coach no doubt being groomed for the head honcho job.

Erstad was a punter for the 1994 national championship Nebraska football team and went on to play 14 seasons in the majors.

In other news

Davis Hendrickson’s hometown paper, the McDonough Voice had a nice write up on his 2011 season including Illinois’ NCAA postseason play.

Weather wreaking havoc with the schedule

The Baseball Zealot — Tue, 29 Mar 2011 17:14:06 +0000

Weather continues to be an issue with the Illinois baseball schedule. The Battle at Busch game tonight against Missouri has been postponed with no makeup scheduled yet.

Also, the time of Wednesday’s game against the Illinois State Redbirds has been moved up to 3:05pm to take advantage of the warmer afternoon weather.

Final two games cancelled against Indiana St.

The Baseball Zealot — Sun, 27 Mar 2011 03:50:45 +0000

The Illini (including Adam Davis (left) and Brandon Hohl), were ready to play today

We were all there today. The the fans (more than I thought would show up in this cold weather) were in the stands, players had gone through all their warm-ups, and announced starter John Anderson was tossing in the bullpen.

Unfortunately, there was no game. Five minutes before the game, the PA announcer notified us that today’s game was cancelled due to the cold weather and the potential of injury of the players. It was also announced that Sunday’s game was also cancelled.

No games appear to have re-scheduled to make up for the two cancelled games.

The next game will be the Battle at Busch on Tuesday at 6pm. Illinois will take on Missouri at Busch Stadium in St Louis.

WKU take two from Illini

The Baseball Zealot — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 03:57:20 +0000

Illinois just came away with a 1-2 weekend against Western Kentucky University. Without being snide, they did win a game. WKU have a tough team and Illinois came off a pretty rough weekend down in DeLand, Florida.

Saturday’s win came at the hands of the John Anderson / Chris Pack combination which has worked relatively well this season to say the least. Those two who have pitched on every Saturday so far this year are responsible for three of Illini’s four wins. This time it was Anderson who picked up the win in Illinois’ 9-5 victory on Saturday. Pack pitched three innings and while it doesn’t look like it was pretty (he gave up three runs on two hits and two walks), he got the save.

Another bonus for Saturday… Illinois showed some signs of power. Both Adam Davis and Josh Parr hit dingers both their first of their year. Davis had 4 ribbies to go along with his tater.

On Friday, Kevin Johnson was once again the victim of no offensive support. He pitched well giving up just three runs in seven innings but unfortunately the Illinois bats were quiet. Illinois only scored once in the ninth on a Josh Parr sac fly preventing a Hilltopper shutout. WKU won 3-1.

Sunday’s game was a bit of a roller coaster ride. Unfortunately, the coaster ended up pulling into the Hilltopper station when all was said and done. WKU got off to a 6-1 lead before Illinois got into gear. Three unanswered Illini runs made it 7-5 until WKU scored three runs in an inning twice making the final score 13-5. Getting on base was not the issue for Illinois in that game. They had 11 hits and walked four times. Unfortunately, getting them home was. Illinois brought in six relievers in Sunday’s contest.

Random Ramblings

I was out of town this weekend and primarily out and about so instead of following the games’ Live Stats on a full screen of a computer, I was reduced to watching it on my Android smart phone which actually worked ok but I wouldn’t recommend it. Lots of squinting and resizing of the resizing of the screens.

Next up

Believe it or not, the next game is in Illinois. Maybe not Illinois Field but it’s in our fair state. On Thursday, Illinois will begin a four game stint in southern Illinois. The first game will take place at Rent One Park in Marion, Illinois against Northern Illinois. One day later they will play the same team in Carbondale. Also on the schedule this weekend in Carbondale are St Louis University and host Southern Illinois.