CAROL STREAM, Ill. – The Carthage College baseball team continued to stay hot despite the wintery spring that continues to hit the Midwest, defeating the Thunder of Wheaton College at Lee Pfund Stadium on Tuesday, 5-3.
 
With the win the Red Men improve to 22-5 on the season and move to 9-1 in the College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin, while Wheaton falls to .500 at 13-13 and to 4-7 in the CCIW.  The win also marks the fourth series win to start the conference season for the Red Men.
 
Nate Odahl became the second pitcher of the season for the Red Men to move to 5-0 on the season, joining Kevin Tibor, whom currently sits at 6-0.  Odahl went 6.0 innings allowing just one earned run on five hit and two walks, while striking out two as well. 
 
Offensively, Vince Schwartz opened the scoring in the bottom of the first with a two-run RBI double that scored Nick Pierce and Cody Phelps, and Schwartz later scored on a wild pitch.
 
After a run in the second by the Thunder, Ryan Kramer extended the Red Men lead back to three with an RBI single to score Colton Klein and Klein later tripled in the sixth to score pinch runner Jake Mitchell.
 
Wheaton scored a pair off of Matt Willett in the seventh, but the freshman settled down and worked a perfect eighth before turning it over to close Brian Polaski, who worked a scoreless ninth for his single-season record 8th save of the season, passing Sam Wilhelms' record of seven, set back in 2014.
 
The Red Men finished with their five runs on ten hits, while committing one error and leaving eight on base.  The Thunder scored three runs on eight hits and stranded nine, also committing an error.
 
The Red Men will return to action on Thursday to complete their season series with Carroll University.  Carthage will go for the three-game sweep of the Pioneers at Augie Schmidt Field at 3:00 PM