COLUMBUS, Ohio — After snapping a season-high 5-game losing streak and picking up a home series win, the Buckeyes are looking to continue their run in the season’s second half.

A convincing Friday victory and Saturday shutout headlined Ohio State’s weekend against Penn State as the Buckeyes bats scored at least six runs and recorded at least seven hits in all three ballgames.

Perhaps one of the better signs last weekend came from the pitching staff. Ohio State pitchers issued just seven walks following a weekend at Maryland in which they walked 22. Head coach Greg Beals thought highly of the cleaner weekend in terms of free passes.

“We just got to keep doing what we do. A typical Ohio State team is going to be tough at the end of the season,” Beals said Sunday. “It’s a philosophy of ours that we continue developing and continue to get better and use every opportunity that you have as an opportunity to grow and become a better baseball team. We showed signs of playing really good baseball this weekend. Cleaner than we’ve been, and we need to trend that way and keep playing clean baseball and our offense will keep growing as well.”

Ohio State’s offense has been rather sustaining throughout the month of April despite its rankings among other Big Ten teams.

Freshman outfielder Kade Kern collected six more hits in three multi-hit contests last weekend, driving his season’s second home run on Friday. The Buckeyes also saw big flies from redshirt-senior catcher Brent Todys and sophomore outfielder Nate Karaffa, both of whom had multiple hits and at least one RBI in Sunday’s series finale.

Regarded for his gritty play and selfless approach at the plate, junior third baseman Nick Erwin proved valuable on both sides of the ball against the Nittany Lions. Erwin broke an 0-for-19 skid with a 2-for-4 performance Friday, driving home a pair of runs while tripling twice and flashing the leather for six assists through the weekend.

“We didn’t try to do too much. We stayed to our approaches and kept it simple,” Erwin said Friday. “I think one through nine, we got a lot of guys that can really hit. We just got to go hit, not try to do it all by ourselves and just keep passing to the next guy.”

Erwin also leads Ohio State with three sacrifice hits as his 13 walks are tied for second-most. He also is hitting .267 with runners in scoring position.

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Beals said last weekend that he had his pitchers focus on three-pitch decisions in practice, getting his arms to work ahead in counts or force a play in just three offerings.

The clever drill paid off as Buckeyes pitchers didn’t fall behind in counts too often, and junior right-hander Jack Neely led the three starting pitchers with 10 strikeouts.

While redshirt-junior lefty Seth Lonsway may be known for his strikeout numbers, he still led the trio with just three hits allowed, which were all Penn State managed in the 7-0 shutout. Junior right-hander Will Pfennig threw the last two innings from the bullpen, walking one across no hits.

Junior right-hander Garrett Burhenn may have been tacked for six runs in his Friday start, but four came on one swing of the bat behind freshman center fielder Johnny Piacentino’s grand slam. Burhenn still earned the win, wracking seven strikeouts and walking just one.

“We just tried to do the little things right in practice,” Burhenn said Friday. “Doing all the little things right lead to the bigger picture, and the bigger picture is getting wins. That’s what we need to do every week now. It’s just the standard at this point.”

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For the third-straight weekend, a sub-.500 team will oppose Ohio State. The Boilermakers rest 11th in the conference with a 10-18 record. Despite a home-sweep at the hands of Illinois, Purdue has gone 6-4 in its last 10 games.

At the plate, Purdue ranks just above the Buckeyes with a .243 team batting average. Its .340 team slugging percentage is last in the Big Ten, and the Boilermakers’ fielding percentage is tied for third-worst with .963.

Opposing teams have hit .272 against the Boilermakers pitching staff, which has given up the third-most runs with 177.

This weekend presents another opportunity for Ohio State’s offense to take advantage of favorable pitching matchups while playing at home, which has seen the Buckeyes go 8-3 when in Columbus.

“It was definitely tough coming off of a 5-game losing stretch. We were trying not to think about that, we were just concentrating and focusing on the next game,” Kern said. “We knew we were gonna come out and pick it up, so after getting the win last night, it was just kind of the same mindset. As coach Beals always says, he says, ‘Keep building, keep climbing,’ and that’s what we did.”

First pitch at Bill Davis Stadium will be thrown Friday at 6:05 p.m. and broadcast on Big Ten Network Plus.