LINKS:Â LIVE STATS
ST. PAUL, Minn. - This weekend, the Concordia-St. Paul baseball team (14-8, 6-6 NSIC) travels to Minot State (9-13, 3-5 NSIC) for the first ever meeting between the programs at Corbett Field.
The four game series features a Saturday doubleheader with first pitch at 1 p.m. followed by a Sunday doubleheader with first pitch at noon.
The Golden Bears have split their last two series against Minnesota Duluth and Winona State to keep their NSIC record even at 6-6 and in an eighth place tie with Sioux Falls in the standings.
Minot State is coming off a 1-3 weekend against St. Cloud State and previously split a four game series against Sioux Falls. In the Beavers' most recent game, they fell 5-0 to Division I North Dakota State in Fargo, N.D.
Concordia is led by middle infielders
Kyle Dalton (.452/.500/.548) and
Eric Fasnacht (.411/.476/.521) although Dalton has also seen extended action in left and center field.
In the middle of the lineup, sophomore
Ryan Poppitz leads the club with 23 RBI in 21 games along with eight extra base hits and senior
Brooks Beilke has knocked in 15 runs with a .402 OBP. Senior
Drew Turk has also emerged offensively and is third on the team with a .333 average while swinging a hot bat as of late.
Concordia's pitching and defense continues to spark the club, however, and this weekend should see the strong 1-to-4 rotation of
Adam Kramer,
Zach Rengel,
Tyler Brekke and
John Hayes that has worked the previous two weekend series' in that order.
Rengel leads the staff with a 3-1 record and a 1.20 earned run average while opponents hit just .229 against him in 30 innings. Kramer is 3-2 with a 3.19 ERA in a club-high 31 innings. Both have made five starts.
On Sunday, Brekke comes in at 2-1 with a 3.00 ERA in 21 innings and a .222 opponent average while Hayes is 2-1 with a 4.71 ERA in 21 innings.
Concordia's pitchers have combined to post a 3.72 ERA while holding opponents to a .255 average.
Defensively, Concordia has been outstanding with a .973 team fielding percentage with 25 double plays turned in 22 games. The team has also controlled opponents running games, throwing out nine of 22 base stealers.
But the defensive statistics don't tell the entire story as the squad covers a lot of ground and makes spectacular plays on a regular basis.
Minot State comes in hitting .272 on the year and has clubbed twice as many home runs (16) as they've allowed (8). But outside of the long ball, opponents are hitting extra base hits (47 2B, 13 3B) much more frequently than Minot State (28 2B, 3 3B).
AJ Begay is the team's top power source with five home runs and 21 RBI in 20 games while hitting .319/.364/.542 and Paul Vogelsang has hit four home runs and is slugging .628 although he's played in just 14 of the team's 22 games.
The staff is led by Austin Zorn out of the bullpen as he's appeared in half of MSU's games (11) with a 3-1 record and 2.08 ERA in 21.2 innings with a save.
The Beavers have relied on Jesse Goertzen, Austin Berntson, Brock McCashland and Joshua Larsen for 19 of their 22 starts on the mound. Goertzen is the top performer of the bunch with a 2-2 record,4.66 ERA in a team-high 29.0 innings.
