The Carthage College baseball team (15-5, 6-3 College Conference of Illinois & Wisconsin) lost to CCIW-opponent Wheaton College (Ill., 10-15, 5-4 CCIW), 5-1, on Wednesday, April 8 at Augie Schmidt Field in Kenosha, Wis.
With the loss, the Red Men fell out of a first-place tie in the CCIW. Augustana College (Ill., 19-6, 6-3) also fell out of a first-place tie on Wednesday with a 3-1 loss at Elmhurst College. Illinois Wesleyan University (16-6, 7-2), alone for the moment in first place, defeated North Park University, 4-1, on Wednesday night. Carthage has lost three in a row, all in league play.
Carthage took a 1-0 lead in the first inning, scoring a run on the front end of a double play. Wheaton tied the game in the fourth on an RBI-single by Andrew Laucella. The Thunder took a 3-1 lead in the fifth, scoring a run on a wild pitch and another on a sacrifice fly. The Red Men loaded the bases with one out in the bottom of the fifth, but Anthony Fortunato struck out and Jared Knoespel flied out to end the threat. The Thunder added two security runs in the eighth on a two-run double by Laucella and a 5-1 lead.
Carthage managed only three hits, all singles, in the first seven innings off Thunder starting pitcher Daniel Bayer (1-2), who entered the game with an 8.68 earned run average over five appearances. Bayer wound up going eight innings and limited Carthage to one run on five hits, two walks and five strikeouts. Brandon Hrdlicka (Jr., Gurnee, Ill./Warren Township, 3-1), the first-of-four Red Men hurlers, took the loss and surrendered three runs on five hits and five walks. The three Carthage pitchers combined to walk eight Wheaton batters, and the Thunder took advantage of the base runners to steal six bases.
"Wheaton is going to win a lot of games," said Carthage coach Augie Schmidt IV. "They're very athletic, and I think they might be better than we are. We got two-of-three from them, which is what you set out to do in this conference. We were lucky to beat Daniel Bayer last time, and he got us today. Our hitters are young and dumb and didn't adjust, and we got what we deserved today. You also can't walk eight guys on day this cold where neither team is going to get three hits in a row. We gave them a lot of free runners, and it came back to haunt us."
Carthage plays host to conference-opponent Elmhurst College on Saturday, April 11 in a Noon doubleheader, also at Augie Schmidt Field. The Red Men and the Bluejays conclude their three-game series with a 1 p.m. single game on Sunday, April 12 at Butterfield Park in Elmhurst, Ill.