Moline, Ill. - The Thunder baseball team swept a doubleheader at Augustana on Monday night with 4-2 and 5-3 victories over the Vikings. With the wins, Wheaton earns its first sweep of Augustana under the current three-game conference series format (adopted in 2000) and its first sweep of the Vikings since 1993. Wheaton improves to 17-18 overall and 11-7 in CCIW play. Augie falls to 23-13 and 8-10 in the conference.

Wheaton won the opener on Monday afternoon with four runs on five hits and no errors. Augustana manged two runs on seven hits with no errors. In the finale, Wheaton scored five runs on 15 hits with three errors while Augustana was limited to three runs on five hits with two errors. John Schmitz earned the win for Wheaton in the first game with 6.2 innings of scoreless relief, allowing just three hits and one walk while striking out five. Michael Kaufman took the win the nightcap with 8.1 innings of three-run ball, allowing just four hits and striking out three.

The Vikings took the early lead in the lidlifter with a pair of runs in the bottom of the first inning off of Thunder starter Josh Arevalo. Wheaton countered in the top of the third inning to tie the game on a two-run single by Josh Kimmel to score JD Carpenter and Kyle Trivits. Matt Krause gave Wheaton the lead several batters later with an RBI single to center to plate Kimmel to make it 3-2 in favor of the guests.

Schmitz (PICTURED RIGHT) entered in relief in the bottom of the third and issued a walk to load the bases but induced a double play to end the inning. The lineout started a series of 12 consecutive batters to be set down by the sophomore southpaw as Augie would not muster another base runner until a two-out single in the sixth.

Kimmel provided some insurance for the Thunder with a single up the middle to score Alex MaLossi to make the Thunder lead 4-2. Schmitz would strand a pair of runners in the eighth inning but set the Vikings down in order in the ninth to earn his second victory of the series.

Wheaton threatened early and often in the second game but struggled to come up with the big hit. The Thunder loaded the bases in the first and fourth inningsand stranded a runner on third in the top of the fouth to keep the game scoreless.

The Thunder finally found the scoreboard in the top of the sixth inning when Peter Newman singled to right field to score Krause with the game's first run. Entering as a pinch-runner, MaLossi stole second base and moved to third on an overthrow by the Augie catcher. Trivits scored from third on the play. One pitch later, John McKenna laid down a perfect squeeze bunt to score MaLossi to make it a 3-0 Thunder lead.

Wheaton added a run in the seventh on a Johnny Peltz single and Peltz earned another RBI in the top of the ninth with a double to left field. After throwing a complete game shutout in his previous start, Michael Kaufman (PICTURED LEFT) picked up where he left off and shut the Vikings down until the offense cashed in. The Vikings touched the lefty for three runs, two earned, in the bottom of the ninth, but Nick Johnson nailed down the save to earned the sweep with a 5-3 win.

Wheaton will host Calvin College on Tuesday night for a 5 PM nonconference game at Lee Pfund Stadium.

Note Worthy: Wheaton had not won a series against Augie since 2010...Augustana's runs in the bottom of the ninth inning snapped a streak of 17.1 consecutive scoreless innings pitched by Kaufman...Wheaton has now won four straight games for the first time this season...Wheaton also qualified for the CCIW Tournament in 2008, 2009 and 2013.