By Hawk Fanatic

IOWA CITY, Iowa – Iowa baseball coach Rick Heller made a guest appearance on Monday’s Hawk Fanatic radio show and podcast.

The Hawkeyes as a No. 8 seed will face nine-seed Illinois in the Big Ten Tournament at approximately 1 p.m. on Tuesday in Omaha, Nebraska.

Iowa won two of three games against Illinois in the regular season.

Heller’s interview starts one hour into the 90-minutes podcast and lasts for about 20 minutes.

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WATCH/LISTEN LIVE
• All tournament games will be televised on BTN.
• All tournament games will be broadcast on the Hawkeye Radio Network with John Leo on the call. Fans can access the stream free on YouTube, HawkeyeSports.com, or The Varsity Network.
• Live stats will be available on hawkeyesports.com and live updates will be available on X (@UIBaseball)

IOWA’S B1G TOURNAMENT HISTORY
• Iowa is making its 11th straight Big Ten Tournament appearance and the 19th in program history.
• The Hawkeyes are 27-33 all-time in tournament history, including winning its first ever Big Ten Tournament title in 2017. Iowa has made championship game appearances five times (1983, 2010, 2016, 2017, 2023).
• Iowa has won at least one game in nine of the last 10 Big Ten Tournaments and is 18-12 over the past eight tournaments
• Rick Heller is 20-17 in the conference tournament.

BIG TEN TOURNAMENT STREAK
Since Heller took over the program in 2014, only two schools — Iowa and Michigan — have qualified for the Big Ten Tournament each season it has been contested. (There was no tournament in 2020 or 2021 because of COVID.)

IOWA AND ILLINOIS: B1G TOURNEY HISTORY
Iowa and Illinois have met four times in the Big Ten Tournament, with Illinois winning all four games.
• Illinois beat Iowa 4-2 in 10 innings in the most recent and only meeting in Omaha.
• The Illini also won in Ann Arbor in 2007, in 1990 in Iowa City and 1989 in Ann Arbor.

Editor’s note: hawkeyesports.com contributed to this report.