But on Saturday, the bats went cold, and the Wolverines continued to find hit after hit against Dzierwa. Sophomore second baseman McKay went hitless for his last 15 at-bats and was two-for-19 over the past week, while Busch had also slumped, failing to record a hit in his last eight at-bats.

The dreaded slump waits for no one — and this time, it grabbed hold of MSU.

"Hitting is the hardest thing to do in sports," MSU baseball head coach Jake Boss Jr. said. "Because of that, you're gonna have plenty of highs and plenty of lows. We tell our guys all the time, 0-for-10 is coming, because it comes for everybody, and that's how we deal with it."

The offensive struggles didn’t end with Busch and McKay. MSU recorded just six hits, three of them from right fielder Parker Picot. Picot, swinging a hot bat, went 6-for-8 over the weekend with three extra-base hits. A year after getting only a handful of at-bats at Alabama, Picot is now hitting .319 with a .947 OPS in Big Ten play.

Michigan starter Trent Lally forced weak contact all afternoon, allowing just two hits and one run while striking out four.

Dzierwa, who had averaged over seven strikeouts per game coming into Saturday, couldn’t find the same success in Ann Arbor, managing just three punchouts against Michigan.

In six innings, Dzierwa allowed 10 hits, six runs — three earned — and hit one batter while striking out three. Over his last two starts, he has allowed eight earned runs, matching the total he surrendered across all of his previous Big Ten appearances this season.

"Joe’s stuff is good," Boss said. "They do a nice job of putting the ball in play, especially with two strikes. And again, it was a little bit of that was yesterday too. I thought we made a couple pretty good pitches, and unfortunately, we didn't get anything to show for it."

Michigan’s bats got rolling in the second inning. As they did the night before, the bottom of the Wolverine lineup caused problems for Dzierwa and MSU. With two on and one out, No. 8 hitter Matt Spear reached on an error, and center fielder Greg Pace Jr. followed with a single to load the bases.

Pace Jr. finished the weekend going 6-for-7 with five RBIs, two doubles and two home runs.

Later in the inning, second baseman Mitch Voit singled to left, scoring two and giving the Wolverines all the runs they would ultimately need.

MSU pushed back in the third. The Spartans' seven, eight and nine hitters all reached base to start the inning, bringing McKay to the plate. The Orchard Lake St. Mary’s graduate drew a bases-loaded walk to bring in MSU’s first run of the day. McKay leads the Spartans and ranks ninth in the Big Ten with 34 walks this season.

"We made a lot of weak contact today, we made a lot of weak contact early in the count," Boss said. "We had a hard time getting the barrel of the ball. So maybe you tip your hat to their guy a little bit, but at the same time, we need to be better offensively. We've shown that we are capable of that, and for whatever reason, it didn't happen today."

MSU mounted a last-ditch comeback attempt in the ninth. Three straight two-out singles from Randy Seymour, Nick Williams and Noah Bright produced one run, giving the Spartans a glimmer of momentum heading into Sunday’s game three.