DAVENPORT, Fla. — After being outscored 23-7 in its last two games, the Saint Mary's University baseball team took a different approach in the first game of its spring trip-ending doubleheader against Saint Joseph's Saturday afternoon — the Cardinals rode the right arm of pitcher Andrew Fischer (La Crosse, Wis.) and the legs of Cameron Weber (Holmen, Wis.) and Ryan Csida (Kimberly, Wis.).
 
Fischer tossed a complete-game five-hitter, and Weber and Csida combined to steal five bases, as the Cardinals snapped their two-game losing streak with a 4-2 win over the Monks in Game 1.
 
The Cardinal offense returned to form in the nightcap —banging out 20 hits and scoring 11 runs — but it was still the SMU pitching staff that stole the show, as Eric Stomberg (St. Paul, Minn.) limited Saint Joseph's to two runs on one hit in four innings in completing the sweep with an 11-3 victory.
 
GAME 1: SAINT MARY'S 4, SAINT JOSEPH'S 2
The Cardinals had their running shoes on from the get-go in the opener, stealing five bases and plating four runs in their first at-bat.
 
For the second game in a row, Ryan Csida (Kimberly, Wis.) opened the contest with a hit. The freshman — who led off Friday's 13-3 loss to Benedictine with a solo home run — kicked things off against the Monks with a single, and promptly stole second and third, before scoring on a Cameron Weber (Holmen, Wis.) single. Weber followed suit by stealing second and third, and scored SMU's second run of the inning on a one-out double by Mason Coyle (Madison, Wis.).
 
Brinton Anderson (Pulaski, Wis.) pushed the SMU lead to 3-0 with an RBI single to left, collected the Cardinals' fifth stolen base of the inning, and came around to score on Stephen Golden's (Centerville, Minn.) two-out single, giving Cardinal starter Andrew Fischer (La Crosse, Wis.) a four-run cushion when he took the mound for the bottom of the first.
 
That would be the extent of the Cardinals offense, with the Monks blanking SMU over the game's final six frames.
 
But four runs was more than enough with Fischer on the hill. The senior right-hander limited Saint Joseph's to just two hits — singles in the bottom of the first and the bottom of the fifth — before the Monks got to him for a pair of runs on a double by Michael Wearne and a Cardinal error to whittle the lead to two, 4-2.
 
Fischer surrendered a pair of seventh-inning singles, but wiggled out of a first-and-second, two-out jam by recording a three-pitch, game-ending strikeout — his seventh of the afternoon — to seal the win.
 
Weber closed out Game 1 as the only Cardinal with more than one hit, going 2-for-3 with a run scored, while Csida, Coyle, Anderson, Golden, and Daniel Sherman (Richfield, Minn.) accounted for SMU's other five hits.
 
GAME 2: SAINT MARY'S 11, SAINT JOSEPH'S 3
The Cardinals rode a much more explosive offense in the nightcap against the Monks, scoring in each of the game's first four innings — once in the first, twice in both the second and third, and three times in the fourth to grab a commanding 8-2 advantage.
 
After plating a single run on a passed ball in the first, SMU got singles by Csida and Weber in the second; a two-run single by Will Boeckman (Big Lake, Minn.) in the third; while adding runs on a Saint Joseph error, a Monk balk, and a run-scoring groundout by Golden.
 
Saint Mary's broke the game wide open in the bottom of the sixth, loading the bases with one out on a Coyle single, and back-to-back one-out walks to Golden and Miller, before Sherman belted a bases-clearing three-run double to extend the lead to 11-2.
 
Boeckman led the Cardinals' 10-hit attack, going 3-for-3, while Csida and Sherman each chipped in a pair of hits. Stomberg collected the pitching win, allowing two runs on one hit, while walking two and striking out four.
 
The Cardinals (6-4 overall) are right back in action next weekend, when they head to Carol Stream, Ill., for three nonconference games. SMU will face Aurora (11 a.m.) and Wheaton (5 p.m.) on Friday, before squaring off against the University of Dubuque at 11 a.m. the following morning.
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