March 26, 2017- With a week to prepare, the Concordia University Chicago baseball team traveled to Sauget, Illinois to play at GCS Ballpark to take on two quality regional opponents in Wartburg College and Webster University. This would be the third time that the Cougars have faced Wartburg in a week after a split last weekend in Waverly, IA. In those games, the bats came alive really for the first time all season after a new hitting philosophy was implemented. Looking to bounce back this week, CUC was searching to play a complete game where everything was clicking. Unfortunately, the Cougars came up empty on the day, losing to Wartburg in game one by the final score of 6-2 and to Webster in game two on a walk off single 6-5.
In game one, Adam Schmitt took the mound for the Cougars after earning his first win in relief last week against the Knights. In the first inning, Wartburg got to Schmitt early as they scored two runs on three hits. The Knights added an unearned run in the second to take an early 3-0 lead.
That proved to be enough offense as the Knights left-handed pitcher Tanner Eckhart shut down the Cougars offense, throwing six innings of two hit ball and giving up only one unearned run. Concordia-Chicago mustered just three hits on the game as Eckhart did a good job mixing up his pitches to confuse the Cougars' potent offense.
In game two, Keaton Conner took the mound for Concordia Chicago. Like game one, the opposition jumped out early on the Cougars, taking advantage of some walks and a couple of soft hits. Concordia-Chicago found themselves with their back against the wall again as Webster tacked on another run in the sixth to extend their lead to 4-0.
Then came the huge seventh inning for the Cougars. With one out, Kevin Coppin began the CUC rally with a sharp single to center, followed by a Kevin Garcia single to right, where the outfielder misplayed the ball to allow Coppin to score. However, the relay caught Garcia at third base for out number two. Joey Anderson kept the inning going with a walk, setting up heroics from Bryan VanDuser. The Cougars' shortstop turned on an inside fastball from Webster starter John Lord to send it over the left field wall to cut the Gorloks' lead to 4-3 with the Cougars gaining the momentum. Lord was replaced by left hander Brandon Smith who hit Joe Silva in the shoulder with a curveball to put the tying run aboard. CUC's three hitter, Brent Spohr came up with a huge two-out RBI double with a rocket over the center fielder's head to tie the game 4-4.
The Cougars were able to shut down the Gorloks' offense behind some outstanding relief pitching from Brian Musielak as he retired 10 straight hitters to send the game to extras. In the tenth, the Cougars took their first lead of the day behind a Garcia sacrifice fly to center that scored Mitch Wilson to give CUC a 5-4 lead.
In the bottom half of the tenth, the Gorloks' Kyle Uhrich led off with a triple off the left field wall to put the tying run at third off Cougars' right hander Mike Formella. After a walk to the next hitter, Joe Swanson tied the game with a single to right. However, Formella was able to get a strikeout and fielder's choice from the next two batters, and CUC was one out away from escaping the jam as the Gorloks had the winning run on third. But Conner Wardlaw came up big for Webster as he hit the game-winning single in the right-center gap to give the Gorloks a 6-5 win in 10 innings.
The Cougars will host the University of Dubuque for their home-opening doubleheader on Tuesday, March 28 at 1 p.m. The team then begins defense of its Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference title this weekend with games at Marian University in Fond du Lac, WI on April 1 and at home versus the Milwaukee School of Engineering on April 2.
