KENOSHA, Wis. – Carthage College won a pivotal rubber match on Tuesday at Augie Schmidt Field as the Red Men baseball team pulled away in the late innings to defeat the Elmhurst College Bluejays, 16-8.
 
The win moves the Red Men, for the time being, into fourth place in the CCIW with a 10-8 College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin record and overall record of 18-14, while the Bluejays fall to 17-16 and 10-9 in the league.
 
The Carthage bats came to life after falling behind 2-0 with an RBI single by Matt Rave to cut the deficit to one after one inning.  Carthage then erupted for six runs in the second to open up a 7-2 lead.  Following a single and an error on a ball hit by Drew Korosic to score Nick Pierce, the Red Men loaded the bases up for cleanup hitter Reed Hero who blasted a grand slam homerun to left to score Rave, Jordan Wiegold and Jared Knoespel.  The Red Men would bat around in the inning with Nick Pierce, who led off the second, driving in Zach Wade to cap-off the scoring.
 
The lead would last less than an inning however; as the Bluejays touched up starting pitcher Joe Nelson and Jonathan Uba for a combined six runs in the second with just two being earned. 
 
Reliever C.J. Casey then came in and shut the Bluejays down while the Carthage bats heated back up.  Casey, who was making just his second appearance of the season, threw four innings of shutout baseball, allowing just four base runners on three hits and a walk.  Casey picked up his first win of the season in the 52-pitch appearance, which he forced the Bluejays into six flyouts and five groundouts in the outing.

"C.J. was pretty much the man of the hour today," said head coach Augie Schmidt following the win.  "He had only pitched an inning of varsity ball this year and today just went out there and gave us four solid innings that really allowed us to settle down because things were going bad.  We were struggling to get guys out and he came in and did a fantastic job."
 
Nick Pierce would answer again for the Red Men, as an RBI single to right drove in Ryan Rodgers in the fourth to tie the game at 8-8 in the fourth.
 
Then in the fifth and seventh inning, right fielder Jared Knoespel put the Red Men ahead for good with a solo homerun and a two-run homerun to extend the Red Men's lead to 11-8. 
 
On the hitting of Jared Knoespel Schmidt said, "Jared has been pretty clutch all season.  Those hits today to put us up and tack on some insurance runs were huge.  It was one of those games today that had so many ups and downs that between C.J. and Jared, they really righted the ship for us when we needed it most."

The Red Men then added on with Pierce's team-leading third, fourth and fifth RBIs of the game, as well as runs driven in by Anthony Fortunato and Ryan Rodgers to close the scoring for Carthage.
 
Alex Tinkoff and Tim Sulik combined to finish the final 2.1 innings to seal the win.
 
As a team, the Red Men combined for their 16 runs on 18 hits led by catcher Nick Pierce who went 4-4 with five RBIs.  Reed Hero added four RBIs on three hits and Drew Korosic went 3-4 in the win.  Rounding out the multi-hit games by Carthage were Knoespel, Wiegold and Rodgers with two apiece.
 
The Red Men will now hit the road for another huge three-game series at Augustana College over the weekend, beginning with a doubleheader on Saturday.  First pitch is set for 1:00 p.m.

"Today was a big win over a good team.  Winning the series against Elmhurst is huge for us and now we move on to Augustana this weekend."