st. Paul, minn. - outhitting the minnesota duluth bulldogs (12-12, 3-1 nsic) on the day, the concordia softball team (18-14, 2-2 nsic) walked away with a split in action on sunday at the rice and arlington fields. They secured a 3-0 in the opening game and mounted a comeback in the second before falling 5-10.

the golden bears are slated to make their first home appearance at dunning field this wednesday, hosting southwest minnesota state in an nsic doubleheader. With inclement weather on the way, stay tuned to www.cugoldenbears.com for any potential updates.

sophomore pitcher stephanie schmikla brought a no-hitter into the fifth inning in the opening game with minnesota duluth. Backed by a defense that did not commit an error, schmikla burned through the outs in the first four innings. She finished the complete game win by allowing only three hits, one single in each of the final three frames.

the golden bears put up enough hits to get the win, gaining base in some form in five of their six turns of bats. Leaving two runners behind in the first inning did not deter the team, who put up the go-ahead run in the third inning. anna bjorlin led off with a single and made it all the way to third as the bulldog third baseman threw the ball away. Umd's kristin danielson did a good job of containing the next two batters to put a set of outs on the board, but jamie lindboe stepped up with a single to give her team the lead.

concordia's next two runs scored came with the help of walks, as both players notching the fourth and sixth inning runs gained ground on a free pass. Aggressive base running by nikki scherr led to a minnesota duluth miscue and allowed the cu catcher to come around to score. Lindboe took her second walk of the game in the sixth and worked her way home via an abby brundidge double and a sami mattson single, with the rbi going to mattson.

the golden bears had five hits to umd's three and played the field cleanly, while the bulldogs made three fielding errors. The team's five hits were spread between five players. Schmikla allowed only three hits and took the shutout win.

while the bulldogs controlled the majority of the momentum in the second game of the day, the golden bears made things interesting by drawing to within a few manageable runs in the late innings. Cu matched umd's 13 hits, putting up four knocks in the sixth inning alone as they mounted their rally.

minnesota duluth, on the other hand, had concordia's number nearly the entire game, teeing off of the golden bear pitching staff on their way to an early and then large lead. They sent nine players to the plate in a four-run second inning, marking four hits and taking two walks. Whitney olson delivered a two-run single that ran in the middle of four straight umd batters reaching base.

a concordia fielding error was followed by consecutive ground rule doubles in the third inning as minnesota duluth went up 6-1 on the golden bears. Concordia then answered with two runs in the bottom of the third. anna bjorlin pried a walk out of starting pitcher heather stemper, advanced on a katie anderson sacrifice bunt, and then scored with a calli brennan double that flirted with home run potential. Brennan then switched positions with abby brundidge, who drilled a piercing double down the left field line.

concordia had a strong fourth inning as well, but could not get the well-timed hit to draw in any closer than 7-3 until the sixth inning. It was with two outs that the golden bears put together four straight hits and drew to within two runs, 7-5. Bjorlin doubled and scored on an anderson single. Anderson reached second on an error by the center fielder, which came in handy as brennan then stepped up and doubled to left field.

cu's offense was put in a tough position following the top of the seventh inning, however, as two doubles and two singles for the bulldogs stretched the game back out at 10-5. They put the lead-off batter on in the bottom of the frame, but could not muster the hits to once again come back.

brennan led the team with two hits and two rbi in game two. Anderson was 2-for-3 at the plate, while tiff rodd went 3-for-4 with an rbi. All three of cu's pitchers worked at least one inning. cassye mcmahon took the loss after giving up four hits and four earned runs with six outs put in the books.