IOWA CITY, Iowa – For the second night in a row, the Iowa baseball team prevailed in a must-win situation against Penn State.

Junior Cole McDonald made an encouraging return from injury by starting Friday’s game and throwing four shutout innings, while the Iowa offense finally woke up in the fifth inning by scoring five runs as the Hawkeyes cruised to a 9-1 victory at Banks Field.

Iowa improved to 32-18 overall and 12-9 in the Big Ten and will look to sweep the Nittany Lions in Saturday’s regular-season finale. First pitch is scheduled for 6:35 p.m. at Banks Field

The Hawkeyes opened the series with a 3-1 victory on Thursday as junior southpaw Nick Allgeyer threw seven shutout innings.

Iowa already has secured a spot in the Big Ten Tournament, which will be held next Wednesday through Sunday in Omaha, Neb. But the Hawkeyes have to sweep Penn State and probably win at least two games in the conference tournament to have a realistic chance of making the NCAA Tournament for the third time in five seasons under head coach Rick Heller.

With Friday’s game still scoreless in the bottom of the fifth inning, Iowa finally broke through on senior catcher Tyler Cropley’s two-run double to left field.

Matt Hoeg then followed with a two-run single and the Hawkeyes were suddenly in the midst of a big inning.

Penn State then answered with one run in the top of the sixth inning, but didn’t score again.

Cropley belted his 20^th double of the season with the bases loaded in the seventh inning as all three runners scored to expand Iowa’s lead to 9-1.

Mitchell Boe led the Iowa offense with three hits, while Cropley drove in five runs.

McDonald was outstanding in his first appearance in over two weeks. He recorded seven strikeouts in four innings before being replaced by Grant Judkins in the fifth inning and with the game still scoreless.

There was concern that McDonald would be lost for the season after he left a recent game with pain in his right throwing arm. McDonald already has had Tommy John surgery on his elbow, so it was easy to assume the worst when he felt a sharp pain after throwing a pitch.

But there was no structural damage and two weeks of rest appears to be just what McDonald needed to regain his form.

His performance, coupled with Judkins' solid work in relief is just what Iowa needed from a pitching standpoint. Judkins only allowed one run in five innings of relief.

Iowa should have plenty of fresh arms for Saturday's season finale.

Iowa has no margin for error after losing two of three games at lowly Northwestern last weekend. The back-to-back victories over Penn State will have little impact on Iowa’s RPI because the Nittany Lions are a Big Ten bottom feeder, but to lose any of the three games would put Iowa in a difficult situation of having to win the Big Ten Tournament in order to make the NCAA Tournament.

Iowa certainly has the potential to win the conference tournament after winning it last year for the first time and finishing as the runner-up in 2016.