Chicago, Ill. - The Thunder baseball team put an end to a seven-game losing streak on Tuesday afternoon with an 8-4 victory at North Park University to improve to 6-11 on the season and 4-7 in the CCIW. Wheaton scored in each of the first three innings on Tuesday en route to a 15-hit performance. North Park falls to 8-9 overall and 3-9 in conference play. Wheaton will return to Lee Pfund Stadium on Friday night when the Thunder host Augustana College for a 5 pm first pitch.
Doubles by
Jesse Welch and
Joel Pierce gave Wheaton the early lead in the top of the first inning with Pierce driving in two runs with his two-out hit before coming in to score on a
Sam Reichert single. Wheaton added two more runs in the top of the second when
Graham Core led off with a double and scored on a single by Welch.
Ben Weaver drove in the second run of the inning with a double to plate
Cale Lewis.
Mason Packwood then pushed the lead to 6-0 with a solo home run in the top of the third inning.
Staked to the early lead,
Brendan Dyer held the Vikings out of the hit column until the third inning before the Vikings plated a pair of runs. Dyer would pitch Wheaton out of trouble in the fourth inning and fifth innings, stranding a pair of runners in the fourth, and cleaning up his own mess by stranding the bases loaded in the bottom of the fifth following three walks.
Weaver pushed the lead out to 8-2 with an RBI single in the top of the sixth inning and sacrifice fly in the top of the eight inning to make it 8-2. The Vikings would connect for two runs in the bottom of the eighth but get no closer than the final score of 8-4.
Jesse Welch led the Thunder attack with three hits and a walk with a run scored and run driven in.
Ben Weaver drove home three runs and was one of five Thunder hitters with two or more hits on the day.
Sam Reichert,
Graham Core, and
Cale Lewis also had two hits with Core and Lewis each scoring two runs.
AJ Dhus,
Bjorn Bostrom, and
Alex Hanvey each provided an inning of scoreless work in relief of Dyer who allowed just two runs on six hits over five innings of work in earning his second victory of the year.