After returning to action this past weekend, the Concordia University Chicago baseball team (1-3) will hit the road again this week with trips to Wheaton College (2-4) on Wednesday, March 17, and North Park University (5-0) on Thursday, March 18. 

The Cougars opened with four games at DePauw, getting swept in Saturday's doubleheader before splitting Sunday's. The bats were quiet in the opener, but the team scored a combined 33 runs over the final three games. 

One reason for the impressive offensive output thus far has been Aidan Donovan's (Santee, Calif.) production out of the nine-hole. The freshman leads the team with five RBIs and is tied for the team lead in hits with seven. Batting .438 with two walks, Donovan has acted as a double lead-off man for the Cougars. 

Tied with Donovan for the team lead in hits is junior Kevin Garcia (Chicago, Ill.). The catcher showed some power so far, with a pair of extra base hits including a home run over the weekend. 

Power appears to be a strength of this year's Cougar team. They had 18 extra base hits against DePauw, six of which were home runs. The leading catalyst is senior Brody Mariotti, whose three home runs over the weekend have him slugging an impressive .889 percent. 

The Cougars balanced that power with speed, swiping 12 bases on 15 attempts last weekend. The weekend showed a lot of positive signs, but Head Coach Kolin Conner hopes his team will take another step this week. 

"We have to continue to get better every day," Conner said. "We learned how to respond last week, but this week we need to learn how to finish. We need to focus on playing our game and controlling what we can control." 

Wheaton won their opener as well as their most recent contest, but have four losses wedged in between the victories. Sophomore Ben Weaver has been impressive for the Thunder so far, batting .409 with three triples, four RBIs and six runs scored. Another player to keep an eye on is senior Graham Core, who is an impressive 6-6 on steal attempts this season.

The edge in power should belong to CUC, as Wheaton hit a total of zero long balls through six games this season. The all-time series is tied at 14 a piece, with the Cougars winning each of the last three dating back to 2014. 

Wednesday's starter at Wheaton will be Cade Laudenschlager (Cave Creek, Ariz.). The senior made his season debut out of the bullpen over the weekend, tossing 2.2 innings, allowing three earned on six hits and striking out three. 

North Park opened their season with back-to-back doubleheader sweeps of the Dominican Stars. They are led by a pair of redshirt seniors in Jake Reinhardt and Justin Woolbright, who both have seven RBIs through five games. Reinhardt is batting .350 with a pair of triples and a double while Woolbright is the only Viking to go deep so far this season. 

The Cougars will be the more battle-tested team in Thursday's game after their exciting battles with a solid DePauw team over the weekend. CUC leads the all-time series 14-11, but they have dropped the last two. It's the first of two meetings between the teams this year. 

Wednesday's game at Wheaton will begin at 5 p.m., while first pitch at North Park on Thursday is scheduled for 2:30 p.m. Coverage of both games will be available on the team's websites:

Wheaton