NORMAL, Ill. – The Milwaukee baseball team doubled up the Illinois State Redbirds on Tuesday evening by the score of 4-2 at Duffy Bass Field in Central Illinois.
 
The Panthers used seven pitchers and had nine hits on the game including three by leadoff man Luke Seidel, who also recorded the team's lone extra-base hit of the game.
 
"Today was a great win for us," said head coach Scott Doffek. "Other than the line drive lost in the sun we played a very clean game and did just enough situationally on offense to scratch four runs across."
 
In addition to Seidel's three hits, Marcus Cline and Ty Olejnik had multi-hit games on the afternoon with Olejnik and Mark Connelly picking up RBIs on the day.
 
Andy Neu got the start for the Panthers and allowed just one run over a career-high four innings of work as he yielded just one run on three hits. Ryan Hoerter pitched a scoreless fifth before he and Nick Gilhaus combined to close out the sixth.
 
Riley Frey made just his second career relief outing and needed 11 pitches to get through the seventh inning. Sam Mathews finished off the eighth inning, while Nate DeYoung closed out the game for his eighth save of the season.
 
After Illinois State scored a run in the opening inning, Aaron Chapman led off the top of the second with a five-pitch walk but was unable to score.
 
Neu worked though the bottom of the second to bring the Panthers up in the third.
 
Cline was first pitch swinging with one down and singled to left centerfield and moved up to third on Seidel's first hit of the day. A wild pitch allowed Cline to score the tying run and push Seidel up to second. Olejnik was up next and singled through the infield to plate Seidel to give Milwaukee its first lead of the game at 2-1.
 
Neu hit the second batter he faced in the bottom of the third but was able to pick off the runner in a steal attempt to keep the Redbirds in check.
 
Hoerter came on in the bottom of the fifth and stranded a runner on third to bring the Panthers back up to bat.
 
Seidel had a leadoff double before Olejnik singled on a bunt to put runners on the corners with nobody down. Connelly connected on a key base knock past the originator to put Milwaukee ahead by a 3-1 score.
 
The Redbirds got a run back in the bottom of the sixth before Gilhaus was able to come on and strike out the last batter of the inning.
 
Carson Hansen walked on four-straight pitches and then promptly stole second. Thomas Otto followed with a bunt single to put runners on the corners. With Seidel batting, a wild pitch was thrown allowing Hansen to score the fourth Milwaukee run.
 
Frey made his way through the seventh, before Adrian Montilva came on in the eighth and allowed a pair of baserunners ahead of Mathews coming on to ultimately strand the bases full of Redbirds.
 
Milwaukee threatened again in the ninth as Seidel reached on a one-out single and then stole his 15th base of the season. A groundout pushed Seidel to third, but the Panther leadoff hitter was stranded 90 feet away.
 
DeYoung came on and hit the first batter before a wild pitch and passed ball allowed the runner to reach third. The Panther closer got the first out of the inning on a 12-pitch strikeout before striking out the next batter on four pitches. DeYoung got the last out of the game on a fly ball to Seidel as the Panthers notched their 17th win of the season.
 
Milwaukee will next play host to the Northern Kentucky Norse beginning on Friday afternoon with a 4:00 p.m. start from Franklin Field. The three-game series will continue Saturday at 1:00 p.m. and Sunday at 12:00 p.m.