ST. PAUL, Minn. – The Concordia-St. Paul baseball team (18-21, 12-15 NSIC) is set to wrap up their regular season home slate this week with a Wednesday meeting with Wayne State (23-19, 18-12 NSIC) before hosting Sioux Falls (16-24, 13-17 NSIC) on Friday and Saturday at Barnes Field. First pitch is set for 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday and Friday and noon on Saturday.
 
GAME INFORMATION
CSP kicks off action this week on Wednesday with a doubleheader against the Wildcats of Wayne State starting at 1:30 p.m. With potential inclement weather in the forecast for Wednesday there will be no webcast, but live stats will be available at cspbears.com/livebase.
 
It will be a quick turnaround for the Golden Bears with an off day on Thursday before kicking off a four-game series with the Cougars on Friday. The series was originally scheduled for Saturday and Sunday, but rain in the forecast for Sunday pushed the games up a day. The contests are set to begin at 1:30 p.m. on Friday and noon on Saturday with webcast and live stats available both days.
 
In addition to being the final scheduled home games of the season, Saturday's doubleheader also marks Senior Day for Concordia. CSP will honor their eight seniors, including six pitchers and two hitters. The list of 2017 seniors includes Kevin Woebke, Josh Lenz, Erick Kivi, Erik Monson, Patrick Courtney, Jake Kounkel, Joe Muench and Andrew Shotwell. The group will be honored with a brief on-field ceremony following game two on Saturday.
 
PUSH FOR THE POSTSEASON
The Golden Bears enter the last few weeks of the season locked in a battle for a spot in the NSIC Tournament. CSP controls their own destiny as they currently sit in seventh place, virtually a half a game ahead of Sioux Falls, Winona State and Minnesota Crookston. With the top eight teams earning a spot in the tournament, Concordia has a golden opportunity to separate themselves from the pack with four games against USF and four more against Winona State to conclude the season following the mid-week showdown with fourth-place Wayne State.
 
LAST TIME OUT
The Golden Bears will look to bounce back after a tough weekend that saw them drop all four games at Barnes Field to the Vikings of Augustana.
 
After being shut out at UMD on Wednesday, CSP slashed .283/.353/.391 with three home runs over the weekend against Augie. Five members of the Concordia starting lineup hit at least .294 with four hits or more for the week as the group combined for three doubles and three homers.
 
Freshman shortstop Patrick Bordewick put together a solid week at the plate as he went 6-15 (.400) with a double, a home run and three RBIs for the week while Connor Olson picked up a team-leading seven hits to finish with a .389 average during the week.
 
CSP nearly managed to steal game two of the series as they erased a 7-1 deficit in the eighth inning to tie it up, but the Vikings answered with four in the ninth to hold off the Golden Bears 11-7.
 
SERIES HISTORY VS WSC
Concordia enters into this week's meeting with the Wildcats with a record of 11-33 in 44 previous meetings between the two schools. CSP has started to shift the momentum in their favor in recent history, however, as they have won all four meetings dating back to 2015, snapping a nine-game winning streak for Wayne State. WSC's last win against the Golden Bears came in a four-game sweep back in 2012. In 14 meetings in St. Paul, CSP has claimed two wins.
 
LAST MEETING WITH THE WILDCATS
The two teams met back on March 9^th at US Bank Stadium in the second game of a split doubleheader as the Golden Bears grabbed a 4-3 win.
 
Pitching was the story as the Golden Bears rode the duo of Connor Hurley and Josh Lenz to the victory. Hurley (1-0) was impressive in his first collegiate start, retiring the first 11 hitters he faced en route to picking up the win. The freshman right-hander allowed just one run on two hits as he struck out eight in 5.0 innings before giving way to Lenz. Lenz picked up his second save of the year as he worked the final four innings while sending the first nine hitters he faced down in order. Overall, he allowed two runs on four hits with three strikeouts. 
 
Steven Nessler collected three of the team's five hits. He doubled, drove in two, stole a base and scored a run in the game.
 
SERIES HISTORY VS USF
Since the Cougars joined the league in 2013 the two teams have gotten pretty familiar with each other, playing four-game series' each year. CSP holds a record of 11-5 in the 16 all-time meetings, including a record of 8-4 in St. Paul. The Golden Bears had won eight in a row in the series until the Cougars took the final two meetings last year.
 
LAST MEETING WITH THE COUGARS
After CSP took the first two games of the site-reversed series in St. Paul last season, the Cougars responded with a pair of extra inning wins to wrap up the four-game slate between the two schools.
 
As a result, Sioux Falls served as the home team in the games and would bat second which was a key factor in the outcome of today's games. The Cougars won on a walk-off fly ball single to the left center gap in game one with two outs and runners on first and second; and won with no outs in the ninth in game two on a walk-off single down the right field line with runners on first and second.

After game one went to extra innings, the second game was automatically shortened from a nine to a seven inning game. But a scoreless tie sent game two to nine innings anyway. The 17 inning doubleheader was played in a cumulative time of 4:13.