Just four days ago, the Penn State baseball team was sitting in a tie for second place in the Big Ten with an opportunity to claim first.

Now, after losing all four games of their weekend series at Minnesota, the Nittany Lions are facing an up-hill climb.

With a chance to overtake Minnesota with a series sweep, Penn State (10-16, 5-7 Big Ten) lost Friday's game 19-1, dropped both games of Saturday's doubleheader, 4-3 and 2-1, and then botched yesterday's game 8-1.

In the blowout loss on Friday, the Golden Gophers (20-11, 10-0) scored four runs off of Penn State junior right-hander Clayton Hamilton and had a 5-0 lead heading into the eighth inning. With two outs in the decisive eighth frame, Minnesota proceeded to destroy Penn State freshman left-hander Steve Cline to the tune of 12 unearned runs on 12 hits.

While the Gophers slugged 25 hits in the game, the Lions managed only three, the first of which came in the fifth inning. Minnesota freshman left-hander Glen Perkins went the full nine innings, allowing only five base runners and striking out eight for the win.

Penn State baseball coach Joe Hindelang said that while the numbers may seem gruesome, the Gophers are the barometer for the league and boast a very talented pitching staff.

"There's an old cliché in baseball that says 'Good pitching shuts down good hitting,'" Hindelang said. "All their pitchers had outstanding arms and they made the pitches when they had to."

On Saturday, the Gophers got the offense when they needed it, scoring two runs in the bottom of the seventh of the second game to grab the win. Minnesota's come-from-behind win marks the third time this season the Lions have lost in their opponent's final at-bat and runs their record to 1-5 in one-run games.

With the chance for the series sweep, Minnesota was quick from the start of the game yesterday, scoring six runs in the second inning en route to the win. Against Penn State junior right-hander Jim Farrell in the bottom of the second, the Gophers had four hits and scored two runs before the Lions could record an out in the inning.

Penn State senior center fielder and tri-captain Zack Smithlin said that absent the several poor innings, the Lions had a chance to win each game. "Obviously, that's one of the better teams we're going to play," Smithlin said. "If we can take away one inning in Friday's game, we're going to be fine."

While Penn State had some timely hits in the series to get on base, it couldn't bring in those runners. In the final three games of the series, the Lions stranded 22 runners on base, including 10 in Saturday's 2-1 loss. Still, the team's tone was generally positive on Sunday. Senior left fielder and tri-captain Wes Reohr said the team played well in the series and was within a bad inning or two from splitting the series.

"I feel like we all played pretty well," Reohr said. "We hit the ball hard, but their fielders were everywhere we hit."