Box Score 1 | Box Score 2 The Carthage College baseball team (20-19, 9-12 College Conference of Illinois & Wisconsin) closed out its 2014 season on Saturday, May 3 by sweeping a doubleheader from CCIW-opponent North Central College (24-13, 12-9 CCIW), 12-11 in 11 innings and 7-3, at Zimmerman Stadium/Alumni Field in Naperville, Ill.  The Red Men opened the three-game series on Friday, May 2 with an 8-2 loss to the Cardinals at Augie Schmidt Field in Kenosha, Wis. 
 
In Saturday's opener, Carthage jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first inning of the opener on a two-run home run by Drew Bailey.  Zach Wade scored on an infield error in the third to make it a 3-0 game.  The Cardinals scored a run in the fourth and then took a 4-3 lead in the fifth on a long home run to left-center field by Joe Paparone.  RBI-singles by Alex Khoury and Sam Carius in the sixth, along with a sacrifice fly by Paparone, upped the Cardinals' lead to 7-3.  Carthage cut that lead to 7-4 in the seventh on an RBI-single by Nick Schmidlkofer, but the Red Men had two runners cut down at the plate and left the bases loaded.  North Central scored three more in the seventh to lead, 10-4, before
 
Carthage tallied three in the eighth, and the lead was 10-7.  The Red Men came up with three runs in the top of the ninth to tie the contest, 10-10.  Zach Wade hit a two-run homer, and the next batter, pinch-hitter Matt Rave hit a solo shot.  In the 10th inning, Mike Pugliese's RBI-single gave the Red Men an 11-10 lead, but the Cardinals tied it again in the bottom half. Carthage scored the final, go-ahead run in the 11th when Nick Schmdlkofer tripled and scored on a sacrifice fly by Reed Hero. 
 
The Red Men collected 22 hits in the game.  Mike Pugliese (Sr., Naperville, Ill./Wheaton-St. Francis) went five-for-seven with two runs and two RBI, while Nick Schmdlkofer (Jr., Wind Lake, Wis./Muskego) went four-for-seven with two RBI.  Sam Wilhelms (Sr., Fond du Lac, Wis.., 3-0), the fourth Red Men hurler, picked up the win.  Wilhelms worked the final three innings and allowed one run on two hits.  Drew Sutton, the fourth-of-five North Central pitchers, took the loss.
 
In the nightcap, Carthage broke a scoreless tie with the four-run outburst in the sixth inning.  Anthony Fortunato hit a two-run double, Matt Richer an RBI-single and Nick Schmdlkofer an RBI-double.  North Central got a run back in the bottom of the sixth to make it 4-1.  Alex Newberry (Sr., Kenosha, Wis./Tremper, 4-3) started the game but gave way to Raymond Wojciechowski in the eighth.  Wojciechowski gave up two runs to close the margin to 4-3, but Matt Rave hit his second pinch-hit home run on day, this on a two-run shot in the ninth, to put the Red Men up, 6-3.  A Matt Cmiel double made it 7-3 and closed out the scoring.  Wojciechowski was credited with his first save.
 
Carthage's Matt Richer (Sr., Kenosha, Wis./Bradford), who went two-for-three with an RBI, led off the game by getting hit by a pitch for the 24th time this season, which broke a Carthage season record of 23 set by Ryan Lessner in 2000.