EAU CLAIRE, Wis. — The Saint Mary's baseball found themselves on both ends of the extra-inning "thrill of victory and agony of defeat" Thursday afternoon.
 
The Cardinals, riding a season-high five-game winning streak, surrendered a bases-loaded walk in the bottom of the 10th inning in dropping a 5-4 decision to UW-Eau Claire in the first game of the teams' nonconference doubleheader at UW-EC's Bollinger Fields.
 
In the scheduled seven-inning nightcap, Saint Mary's turned the tables on the host Blugolds, getting a run-scoring sacrifice fly from Mason Coyle (Madison, Wis.) in the top of the eighth inning to lift the Cardinals to an 8-7 victory.
 
GAME 1: EXTRA-INNING HEARTBREAK
 
Eau Claire threatened in its first at-bat, putting runners on second and third with one out in the bottom of the first, but Cardinal starter Addison Hochevar (Lake Geneva, Wis.) escaped unscathed — thanks to a strikeout and a ground-out to end the inning.
 
The Blugolds did finally scratch across a run in the bottom of the third, getting a one-out, RBI single by Walter Johnson to give UW-Eau Claire a 1-0 lead.
 
After being blanked on just three hits through the first four innings, the Cardinals broke their scoreless drought in the fifth. Patrick Schork (Janesville, Wis.) led off with a triple to center, and, after back-to-back strikeouts, scored on a Brandon Merfeld (La Crosse, Wis.) squeeze bunt to knot the game at 1-1.
 
Unfortunately, the deadlock did not last long, as UW-Eau Claire loaded the bases with two outs, and scored a pair of runs — one on a wild pitch and another on a Cardinal fielding error — to give the Blugolds a 3-1 lead.
 
The Blugolds tacked on an insurance run in the bottom of the sixth inning, but the three-run advantage would not be enough.
 
After putting two on in the sixth, only to come up empty, Saint Mary's threatened again in the eighth — this time cashing in.
 
Riley Bauman (Stratford, Wis.) tripled with one out in the eighth and Coyle followed with a walk to put runners on the corners. Bauman scored on a throwing error by UW-EC catcher Tyler Nelson and Coyle plated SMU's second run of the inning on a wild pitch to cut the deficit to one, 4-3.
 
The Cardinals would pull even in the top of the ninth — thanks to a lead-off double by Schork and a one-out double by Cameron Weber (Holmen, Wis.) — and survived a ninth-inning scare from the Blugolds to send the game into extra innings.
 
UW-Eau Claire had a golden opportunity to end the game in the bottom of the ninth, getting a lead-off triple from Drew Salyers, only to have Dylan Westcott (Holmen, Wis.) record back-to-back strikeouts and a groundout to end the threat.
 
Coyle led off Saint Mary's 10th with a double and moved to third on a Daniel Marxen (Maple Grove, Minn.) sacrifice bunt, but the junior was left stranded. The Blugolds also threatened in the 10th, loading the bases with one out. Unlike SMU, however, UWEC was able to scratch across a run, scoring the game-winning run on a two-out, bases-loaded walk to Salyers.
 
Schork and Reese Berg (Green Bay, Wis.) each had two hits to pace SMU's 10-hit Game 1 attack, with Weber, Merfeld, Riley Bauman, Coyle, Marxen, and Will Boeckman (Big Lake, Minn.) accounting for the other six.
 
GAME 2: WORKING OVERTIME — AGAIN
If the Cardinals were feeling an ill effects from that extra-inning Game 1 setback, they certainly didn't show it — taking the lead early and never relinquishing it in salvaging the nonconference split.
 
Saint Mary's grabbed a three-run lead in the third inning, getting an RBI single from Coyle to score Sam Schneider (St. Joseph, Minn.) — who opened the frame with a walk — and a two-run single by Marxen.
 
UW-Eau Claire got one run back in the bottom of the fourth off SMU starter Eric Stomberg (St. Paul, Minn.), loading the bases with no one out on a hit batter, a single, and a walk. An RBI groundout by Connor Welk scored the Blugolds' first run of the game,  
 
Saint Mary's answered right back in the fifth, as Riley Bauman walked, moved to second on a Coyle ground-out to third, stole third, and trotted home on a Marxen sacrifice fly to push the Cardinals lead to 4-1.
 
UW-Eau Claire gave SMU reliever Andrew Milner (Eau Claire, Wis.) a rude welcome, scoring a pair of runs off the freshman left-hander to whittle the Cardinal lead to one, 4-3. The two teams then traded sixth-inning runs — SMU's coming on a Merfeld single — leaving the Cardinals clinging to a 5-4 lead.
 
And the back-and-forth continued in the seventh.
 
Schork delivered a clutch, two-out double to score both Coyle and pinch-runner Mason Palmer (Holmen, Wis.) in the top of the seventh, only to have UW-Eau Claire answer with three runs in the bottom half of the frame to knot the game at 7-7 — and send the scheduled seven-inning game into extra innings.
 
SMU made sure it didn't stay tied for long, scoring a single run in the eighth — thanks to back-to-back singles by Merfeld and Weber, and a sacrifice fly by Coyle — to regain the lead 8-7. Jaxon Vance (Eau Claire, Wis.) then set the Blugolds down in order in the bottom of the inning on back-to-back-to-back groundouts to seal the win.
 
The Cardinals (14-19 overall) close out their regular-season schedule on Saturday, playing host to Carleton in a pair of Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference games. First pitch in Game 1 at Max Molock Field is slated for 1 p.m.
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