With plenty of snow and ice in St. Paul, the Golden Bears flew south to Ft. Myers, Fla. to open their 2008 season against St. Leo University, earning a split with a 9-7 win in game one before falling 11-6 in the second game after allowing a seven run fifth inning.

Game One:
Senior first baseman John Maciej powered CU in the first game, going 3-3 with two home runs and five rbi.

His two home runs were outshined by TJ Alonzo's three homers for the Lions. He went 4-4 with six rbi for SLU in the loss.

Both of Maciej's home runs were two run shots, the first coming in the second inning to drive in Zane Froelich who doubled down the left field line with one out. The two run blast put the Golden Bears ahead 2-1.

The lead went back to the Lions in the top of the fourth when Alonzo hit his first homer of the day, a two run shot to left center.

Maciej answered, knocking in Chris Herbert with an rbi single in the bottom half of the inning to tie the score.

Concordia put up six runs in the fifth, all with two outs. Brenden Furrow's two run single to left center started the scoring and was followed by a two run double to right center by Froelich, setting up Maciej's second two run home run of the game to cap off the scoring and giving CU a 9-3 lead.

The Golden Bears provided plenty of offense for Jake Schmidt, who earned the victory after pitching six innings, allowing four runs on six hits with two walks and three strikeouts. Kirk Ingram worked the seventh, allowing three runs on a three run home run by Alonzo.

Furrow and Froelich were each 2-3 with two rbi in the game as the 4-6 hitters combined to go 7-9 at the plate with all nine rbi.

Concordia started the year off perfect in the field as they were error free in their season opener.

Game Two:
Once again Concordia started slow, spotting the Lions with a run in the bottom of the first. They committed their first error of the year which led to an unearned run off starter Blake Devries.

Concordia rallied with the next three runs, scoring in the top of the second with Brenden Furrow and Zane Froelich each reaching on errors before John Maciej delivered a sacrifice fly to record his sixth rbi of the day to tie the score at one.

In the second, Joe Abellera double down the right field line and Jake Waldman walked. They both scored in the inning with furrow producing an rbi single.

St. Leo answered with two runs in the bottom of the third to tie the score at three.

After a scoreless fourth, St. Leo pounded Concordia for seven runs in the bottom of the fifth to take a 10-3 advantage, chasing Devries from the game.

Devries, who took the loss, pitched five innings, allowing 10 runs, seven earned, on seven hits with five walks and three strikeouts. Eric Utoft pitched the sixth inning, allowing a run.

Jon Stockton drilled a two run single in the sixth and Maciej picked up his seventh rbi of the day in the seventh when he was hit by pitch with the bases loaded.

Froelich had the only multi-hit game for CU going 2-3.