MOORHEAD, Minn. (5/04/13)—It was a tale of two games between Concordia and Carleton on Saturday. The Cobbers cranked out 16 hits and won the opener 14-1 while the Knights carved out 12 hits in the nightcap and earned an 8-4 victory.
The split keeps Concordia's conference record at the .500 level. CC is now 6-6 in league games and 13-11 overall. Carleton wins for the third time in the last five games and moves to 13-17 in all games and 3-11 in the MIAC.
The one difference between the two wins for the teams came in the "extra base hit" category – and more specifically the long ball. Concordia had a pair of home runs and a triple in game 1 which accounted for six of the team's 14 runs. Carleton had only three doubles in game 2 and scored only two of their eight runs from extra-base hits.
The Cobbers' first-game scoring barrage started after Carleton had taken a 1-0 lead in the second inning. Concordia proceeded to score at least one run in the next five innings and exploded for eight runs in the fourth frame.
Concordia batted around in the fourth inning and the big blow came off the bat of Kyle Kraemer who hit a 3-run homer over the right field fence. Kraemer wound up going 3-for-3 with 5 RBI in the opener and was a double shy of hitting for the cycle. He also had a two-run triple in the second inning.
The Cobbers had three players with at least three hits in the opener. Besides the 3-for-3 game from Kraemer, Braden Rahman went 4-for-4 with 2 RBI and 3 runs scored while Matt Schalow was 3-for-4 with a RBI and 2 runs scored. Rahman had the other home run of the first game for CC. He cranked out his first long ball of the year over the right field fence in the third inning.
Senior pitcher Jackson Meland was the beneficiary of the Cobber scoring output. He gave up the one run in the second inning and then allowed only one more hit for the rest of the game as he earned his third win of the season. Meland lowered his season earned run average to 3.30 and opponents are now only hitting .219 against the lefty.
The second game was determined by a pair of two-run innings in the third and fifth innings for Carleton. The teams swapped one-run first frames and then both scored three times in sixth but it was the four unanswered runs that cost CC the victory. The Cobbers also hit just .214 (3-for-14) with runners on base, .222 (2-for-9) with runners in scoring position and .125 (1-for-8) with two outs in the inning.
Michael Olson and Devin Johnson were the only two Concordia players with more than one hit in the game. Olson was 2-for-4 and drove in three of the four runs in the game. He upped his team-leading RBI total to 19 on the year. Johnson went 2-for-3 and had a lone RBI. Johnson also had a single hit in the first game and improved his hitting streak to 11 games. He went 3-for-5 for the two games and now leads the Cobbers with a .395 batting average.
Concordia used three pitchers in the game. Luke Kramer went the first 5.0 innings before Cooper Wilson pitched the sixth and Bryce Feia finished the seventh. Feia did not allow a run and struck out one in the final inning.
Next up for the Cobbers is a stretch where they will play four MIAC doubleheaders in four straight days. Concordia will have the day off for graduation on Sunday and then host Bethel on Monday, May 6 at 1 p.m. CC will then play at St. Olaf on Tuesday, at Hamline in the Metrdome on Wednesday before returning home to host St. Mary's in the final twinbill of the regular season.
