the concordia university baseball team (14-8, 8-4 nsic) dropped a pair of one run games on day two of their road series at the university of mary (7-17, 6-4 nsic) on sunday afternoon in bismarck, n.d. In the first game, cu fell 2-1 before an extra inning 1-0 loss with u-mary winning with a walk-off home run with one out in the bottom of the ninth inning. The losses snap concordia's seven game winning streak. Mike feldman did all the damage, going 6-8 with two rbi including the game two walk-off home run after going the distance on the hill for the win in the first game.
game one: u-mary 2, cu 1
the golden bears managed only four hits and didn't draw any walks behind a solid outing by junior chris kimpton (canberra, aus.).
concordia scored first in the third inning after senior shortstop derek mason led off with a single to right field. ted farni (jr., dh, minnetonka, minn.) and joe abellera (sr., cf, minnetonka, minn.) followed by reaching on errors to load the bases with senior second baseman jake waldman (minnetonka, minn.) driving in mason with a sacrifice fly to right field.
but the threat died when brenden furrow (jr., rf, johnston, iowa) grounded into a 5-4-3 double play to end the inning.
the marauders answered in the bottom of the inning with back-to-back doubles from their 2-3 hitters to tie the score.
in the fifth and sixth innings, concordia was unable to move runners to second base in each inning, grounding into a double play in the fifth with furrow getting caught stealing to end the sixth.
the marauders capitalized with a two out triple in the bottom of the fifth, scoring on a single from the next batter.
in the seventh, the golden bears threatened with junior third baseman zane froelich (sioux falls, s.d.) drilling a one out single. He advanced to second but was stranded with back-to-back groundouts to end the game.
kimpton pitched strong in his fourth start of the season, working a season-long five innings and allowing a season-low two runs. He surrendered eight hits and did not issue a walk for the second time. His six strikeouts were a season-best as well. With the loss, he falls to 0-2 on the year.
junior kirk ingram worked the seventh inning and struck out one while allowing two hits. Since his first appearance when he allowed three runs in an inning to saint leo on the spring trip, ingram has pitched 8.1 innings while allowing one run with all 13 of his strikeouts and he has lowered his era to 3.86.
for concordia, waldman was 1-2 with an rbi and froelich was 1-3. Mason was 2-2 at the plate and scored cu's only run. No one else reached base safely. Concordia stranded three in the loss while u-mary had 10 hits and stranded seven despite only scoring two runs.
mike feldman earned the win for u-mary, pitching a complete game and only allowing an unearned run. He registered two strikeouts and he was not done breaking down the nsic-leading golden bears.
game two: u-mary 1, cu 0 - 9 innings
mike feldman hit a one out walk-off solo home run to left field in the bottom of the ninth off junior josh rohrich (sioux falls, s.d.) for the marauders in the game two victory over the golden bears. It was feldman in the first game who was 2-3 with an rbi double that helped spark the u-mary win as well. For the day, feldman was 6-8 with a double and a home run, driving in two of u-mary's three runs for the day. He went 4-5 in the second game.
this time concordia stranded eight runners, three in scoring position with one more, derek mason, being doubled off third base on a line out to third by jake waldman with the bases loaded and no outs in the third inning.
joe abellera went 2-3 with his ninth double and a walk but he was uanble to come across the plate. Abellera's double was concordia's only extra base hit of the day.
ted farni started for cu, pitching six strong shutout innings. His eight strikeouts were more in one start than in his freshman (5) and sophomore (7) seasons. Making his second start, he continued his strong pitching by lowering his era to 0.69 in 13 innings. He scattered three hits and walked four against u-mary this afternoon.
rohrich took the loss and fell to 0-1 with his first decision. He pitched 2.1 innings out of the bullpen and gave up two hits and walked two while striking out a pair.
the golden bears look to get back in the win column this week when they travel to minnesota duluth on wednesday, april 9 for a 2 p.m. Doubleheader.
