Illinois baseball lost both the game and its weekend series in Nebraska on Sunday.ej

The Cornhuskers (19-8, 5-1 Big Ten) beat the Illini (11-14, 3-3 Big Ten) 9-7, handing freshman pitcher Cole Bellair his first loss of the season in the process.ej

Entering the Sunday’s matchup, Bellair had given up just five runs in 27 and two-thirds innings.ej Despite his consistency, the rookie was tagged for seven in just five innings in the rubber match.ej

“(Bellair) was behind in the count a lot today,” head coach Dan Hartleb said.ej “When you are putting guys on base that didn’t earn it, it is very hard to win at a high level. He just struggled throwing strikes.”

Bellair’s control issues started early and plagued him through his whole outing. After the Cornhuskers went three-up three-down in the first inning, Bellair gave up a single and walked two to load the bases in the second.

Bellair walked four batters in his third start.ej All four of those batters went on to score.

Neither of the Illini’s two veterans in the bullpen — seniors Nick Blackburn and J.D. Nielsen — could keep the Cornhuskers off the board.ej Each gave up one run in less than an inning of work.

The Illini offense scored 21 runs in the three-game series against the Cornhuskers.ej The seven runs per game was the most the Illini had averaged in a game all season.

Senior infielder Michael Hurwitz led the Illini on offense Sunday.ej He batted two-for-four with two RBI’s. A double in the top of the fourth got him both of his RBIs, and kept an Illini two-out rally going. The Illini scored four runs in the fourth, all with two outs.ej

“All weekend I felt like my swing was getting better,” Hurwitz said. “I saw a lot of fastballs. I figured some stuff out and saw the ball well. Then the ball just fell right for me.”

Hartleb said while it was nice to see the Illini put some runs up on the board, he thought his team could do a better job making contact. The Cornhuskers pitching staff struck out nine Illini batters — the most strikeouts for the Illini since their March 13 game against Coastal Carolina (13).

Strikeouts really hurt the Illini in the top of the ninth when they were down 9-7.ej They had already scored one run in the final frame and had runners on first and second with only one out. However, they could not capitalize as both Doran Turchin and Luke Shilling struck out to end the game.ej

Nebraska has the most conference wins in the Big Ten right now at five while the Illini sit in the middle of the pack at seventh.ej The biggest margin of victory for either team this weekend was two runs, and even though Nebraska came away with the series win, he still believes his team can be one of the top teams in the Big Ten.

“I wasn’t very impressed with Nebraska’s pitching,” Hartleb said. “They did a good job offensively, especially in clutch situations, but if we do our job at all this weekend, we win two games and we had opportunities (on Sunday) too. I think we can be a team who can contend if we get our minds right.”

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