Baseball goes 5-1, survives close games

The Northwestern baseball team had a successful week on the diamond, going 5-1 in GPAC play. The run included sweeps of both Midland and Mount Marty, and a split with Concordia.
Coach Brian Wede noticed a steady effort in the field from his team, saying “Our defense this season has been great. We are in the top 10 in the country in defense, and that has really helped us maintain consistency.”
On Tuesday night the Raiders visited Concordia. They picked up an 8-5 win. Sophomore Taylor Morris picked up the pitching win after completing five innings and giving up two runs. Junior Matt Negaard did well in the leadoff spot, going 3-4 with two RBI. Junior Mike Zoellner went 2-4, including a solo bomb to right field.
The bats couldn’t stay warm for the next game, as Concordia sent NW home with a 6-3 defeat. Freshman Ryan Brasser struggled with his command, and was credited with the loss. Morris was the lone bright spot at the dish for the Raiders, going 2-3 with two RBI.
On Saturday, the Raiders hosted Mount Marty. The home team picked up two more wins to the tunes of 13-10 and 6-5, with the late game involving some last-inning heroics.
The first game had two big offensive innings for both squads.  The Raiders banged in nine runs in the fourth, but also gave up seven in the sixth inning. Zoellner got knocked around a bit on the mound, giving up seven earned runs, but still picked up the victory to push his record to 6-0 on the year. Sophomores Corey Van Gorp and Noah Bohlmann both went 2-3 with two RBI each. Junior Mike Shields had five RBI in the contest, four of which came off a grand slam.
The back end of the doubleheader saw the Raiders dig themselves an early hole that led them to be behind 4-1 going into the bottom half of the sixth inning. Senior Clint Gingerich’s three-run homer in that inning brought NW within one.
Down by one in their last time up, freshman Cody Groskreutz and Shields reached second and third base on errors. Zoellner was intentionally walked to load up the bags. Morris, who went 3-4 in the game, came up to bat and singled into left field to bring home a run. A Lancer fielding error on the base knock brought the winning run across the plate. Junior Jesus Santoyo picked up his first win of the season.
Last Friday night, the men won two hard-fought games by the scores of 2-1 and 6-4. Morris was on the mound for the first contest, in which he threw all seven innings, allowing only four hits and striking out five. Gingerich and Bohlmann both went 2-3 at the plate, and Bohlmann knocked in the only two Raider runs.
The second game had more offense for both teams, but three big runs in the top of the seventh inning gave the Raiders the victory. Junior pitcher Eddie Pantzlaff picked up his first victory of the season. Negaard went 3-3 with an RBI. Zoellner was in the outfield for this game, and he went 2-3 and also knocked in a run. Shields went 1-3 but brought two runs across the plate.
Wede said about the recent surge of offensive  output: “I think our guys are really starting to buy into what Coach Boeve is teaching them offensively, and we are starting to see the product come to light. We’ve played enough games now for our guys to get comfortable in the box, and recently we’ve started to see the results of that.”
NW will play Morningside at home Friday night. First pitch is at 5 p.m.