March 6, 2016 – A challenging Spring Break trip for Concordia-Chicago baseball wrapped up in the Sunshine State with a 5-3 record (8-3 overall) for the Cougars after today's split with Babson College of Massachusetts.
 
Game one saw the Cougars fall behind early but come back to defeat a pesky Babson team by a 6-4 score. Alex Meyers (Edwardsville, IL/H.S.) made his third start of 2016 and retired the Beavers through the first two innings before giving up a pair in the third. The Cougars wasted no time in responding, however. Keegan Tyrell (Joliet, IL/Joliet Catholic) led off with a single through the left side. Bryan VanDuser (Plainfield, IL/Plainfield North) then cracked a double to the leftfield corner with Tyrell motoring all the way around for Concordia-Chicago's first run. A sacrifice by Joe Silva (Arlington Heights, IL/Hersey) moved VanDuser to third from where he scored on Mitch Wilson's (Oswego, IL/H.S.) double to the leftfield wall. On the next play, an infield grounder saw the shortstop try to throw out Wilson at third, but the throw sailed into the Babson dugout, and Wilson scored to give CUC its first lead.
 
The top of the fourth featured a great escape act by the Cougars. The Beavers' first two batters were hit by pitches, and CUC head coach Mike Stawski went to the bullpen for Adam Schmitt. The next batter attempted to sacrifice but bunted well enough for a single to load the bases. That brought up Babson's leadoff hitter who ran the count to 3-1 before hitting one back up the middle. The ball appeared to be headed for a base hit, but shortstop Andrew Kroncke (St, Charles, IL/St, Charles North) tracked it down and started a 6-4-3 double play. The tying run scored, but the twin-killing took some wind out of Babson's sails, and Schmitt then got a grounder to third to end the inning and keep the score tied at 3-3.
 
Concordia-Chicago regained the lead in the bottom of the fourth. Kroncke led off with a double just inside the rightfield line. He would tag up and move to third on a fly to right and then score on Silva's gtounder to shortstop.
 
The Cougars pushed across two key insurance runs in the fifth to go up 6-3. Once again, a leadoff hit got things started, this time a single by Connor Brandon (Joliet, IL/Joliet Catholic Academy). Colin Bethran (Schaumburg, IL/H.S.) ran for Brandon and promptly swiped second base. Kroncke's single to centr scored Bethran, and  Kroncke later scored the sixth run as he came home on a sacrifice fly.
 
Babson scored its final run in the seventh on a triple and sacrifice fly, the only run off Schmitt. The sophomore earned his first win of 2016.giving up just the one run on five hits over four innings of relief.

Game two was a letdown for the Cougars. The Beavers fired the first shot with a five-run bottom of the first. The Cougars battled back in the second with a solo homer by Brandon and a two-run shot by Tyrell. Another run in the third put the Cougars within a run, but the Beavers ended any comeback aspirations with three in the third and four more in the fourth. The final score was Babson 12, CUC 5.

The Cougars will now prepare for a four-game swing in Texas next weekend. CUC will play three games against host Concordia University Austin and one game against Howard Payne University.