1996 Big Ten baseball tournament

The 1996 Big Ten Conference baseball tournament was held at Beaver Field on the campus of Pennsylvania State University in State College, Pennsylvania from May 15 through 19. The top four teams from the regular season participated in the double-elimination tournament, the sixteenth annual tournament sponsored by the Big Ten Conference to determine the league champion. Indiana won their first tournament championship and earned the Big Ten Conference's automatic bid to the 1996 NCAA Division I baseball tournament.^[3]

1996 Big Ten Conference
baseball tournament

Teams	4
Format	Double-elimination
Finals site	Beaver Field (baseball) State College, PA
Champions	Indiana (1st title)
Winning coach	Bob Morgan (1st title)
MVP	Dan Ferrell (Indiana)
← 1995 baseball tournament 1997 →

1996 Big Ten Conference baseball standings

v t e	Conf.							Overall
Team	W		L		PCT			W		L		PCT
Penn State  ‍†‍‍	19	–	8		.704			32	–	24		.571
Indiana  ‍‍‡‍y	18	–	8		.692			43	–	18		.705
Illinois  ‍‍‍	17	–	10		.630			37	–	22		.627
Michigan  ‍‍‍	17	–	11		.607			24	–	30		.444
Minnesota  ‍‍‍	15	–	12		.556			30	–	26		.536
Ohio State  ‍‍‍	15	–	13		.536			36	–	20		.643
Iowa  ‍‍‍	13	–	13		.500			25	–	22		.532
Northwestern  ‍‍‍	10	–	18		.357			26	–	29		.473
Purdue  ‍‍‍	8	–	19		.296			22	–	32		.407
Michigan State  ‍‍‍	4	–	24		.143			14	–	41		.255
x – Division champion ‡ – Tournament champion y – Invited to the NCAA tournament As of June 30, 1996[1][2] Rankings from Collegiate Baseball

Format and seeding

The 1996 tournament was a 4-team double-elimination tournament, with seeds determined by conference regular season winning percentage only.^[3]

Team	W	L	PCT	GB	Seed
Penn State	19	8	.704	–	1
Indiana	18	8	.692	.5	2
Illinois	17	10	.630	2	3
Michigan	17	11	.607	2.5	4
Minnesota	15	12	.556	4	–
Ohio State	15	13	.536	4.5	–
Iowa	13	13	.500	5.5	–
Northwestern	10	18	.357	9.5	–
Purdue	8	19	.296	11	–
Michigan State	4	24	.143	15.5	–

Tournament

	Upper round 1					Upper final					Final
	1	Penn State	14
	4	Michigan	3
						1	Penn State	2
						2	Indiana	6
	2	Indiana	6
	3	Illinois	3
											2	Indiana	5	6
											3	Illinois	8	4
	Lower round 1					Lower final
						1	Penn State	3
	4	Michigan	4			3	Illinois	11
	3	Illinois	7

All-Tournament Team

The following players were named to the All-Tournament Team.^[3]

Pos	Name	School
P	Jason Wollard	Illinois
P	Dan Ferrell	Indiana
C	Matt Braughler	Indiana
1B	Phil Bertolotti	Penn State
2B	Brian McClure	Illinois
SS	Josh Klimek	Illinois
3B	Mike Crotty	Indiana
OF	Danny Rhodes	Illinois
OF	Ryan Dillon	Indiana
OF	Mike Spisak	Indiana
OF	Jason Alcaraz	Michigan
DH	Todd McClure	Illinois

Most Outstanding Player

Dan Ferrell was named Most Outstanding Player. Ferrell was a pitcher for Indiana.^[3]