MILWAUKEE – After seven home games over 10 days that saw Milwaukee go 6-1, the Panthers take their hot streak on the road for five games this week. Northwestern is first on the docket Tuesday afternoon, followed by a visit to Notre Dame on Wednesday. The week wraps up with a three-game series at UNLV from Friday through Sunday.

Tuesday's matchup in the Chicago suburbs will begin at 3:30 p.m., while Wednesday's game in South Bend, Indiana, is set for a 5:30 p.m. (CT) first pitch. The first two games in Las Vegas will begin at 8:00 p.m. (CT), before the weekend finale is scheduled for a 2:00 p.m. (CT) start.

Coverage of Tuesday's game will be available on B1G+, while the matchup at Notre Dame will air on ACC Network Extra and require a cable subscription to access via ESPN+. The weekend series against the Rebels will be streamed on YouTube. Links to broadcasts, as well as live stats for all five games, will be available at MKEPanthers.com/coverage.

THE MATCHUPS & GAME LINKS
April 28 | Milwaukee at Northwestern | Rocky & Berenice Miller Park | Evanston, Ill.
Tuesday at 2:30 p.m. | B1G+ / Live Stats | Follow Along (on X)

April 29 | Milwaukee at Notre Dame | Frank Eck Stadium | South Bend, Ind.
Wednesday at 5:30 p.m. (CT) | ACCNX / Live Stats | Follow Along (on X)

May 1-3 | Milwaukee at UNLV | Earl E. Wilson Stadium | Las Vegas, Nev.
Friday at 8:00 p.m. (CT) | Saturday at 8:00 p.m. (CT) | Sunday at 2:00 p.m. (CT) | YouTube / Live Stats | Follow Along (on X)
 
LEADING OFF
» Following a 6-1 homestand, the Milwaukee baseball team heads on the road for a five-game roadtrip that will see them travel to Northwestern on Tuesday, Notre Dame on Wednesday, and a three-game series at UNLV from Friday through Sunday.
» The Panthers lost the final game of their homestand against Wright State on Sunday, which also snapped an eight-game win-ning streak, which was tied for the fourth longest in program history.
» On Monday, the Horizon League selected Aric Ehmke as the league's Pitcher of the Week, Ehmke threw seven shutout innings against Wright State in Saturday's series-clinching win over the Raiders.
» Milwaukee heads to Northwestern to take on its closest competitor in terms of distance on the Division I map, the Panthers and Wildcats will battle at 3:30 p.m on Tuesday. From there, Milwaukee will take on Notre Dame for the first time since the 2008 season and a 5:30 p.m. (CT) first pitch.
» The Panthers will wrap up the week at UNLV for a three-game set in Las Vegas, the Rebels swept the Panthers in a four-game series last season.

QUICK LOOK AT NORTHWESTERN
Entering play this week at 16-24-1 the Wildcats are coming off a three-game trip to Minnesota that saw the Gophers take all three. Following the game against Milwaukee, Northwestern will host Indiana at Wrigley Field on Friday before returning home to close out the three-game series against the Hoosiers. Where'd that tie come from? It was a 3-3 draw against UIC at home back on March 10.

Jack Lausch is Northwestern's lone regular with an average over .300 at .304 with an OPS of .981, he is tied for the team lead with nine home runs and among the team leaders with 29 RBIs. Noah Ruiz and Ryan Kucherak hold the team lead with 33 RBIs apiece, while Lausch and Kucherak account for 67 percent of Northwestern's 21 stolen bases. Local product Jack Counsell of nearby Whitefish Bay High School is a member of Northwestern and has played in of the team's 41 games.

Sitting in a tie for last in the Big Ten Conference alongside Penn State, Northwestern is still among the league leaders in the 17-team conference. The Wildcats are fourth in the league in fielding percentage and are also top five in double plays per game. Offensively, Northwestern is eighth in the league in home runs with 53 this season, and seventh in the league in home runs per game (1.29).

Tuesday will be the 35th all-time meeting between the Panthers and Wildcats, with Northwestern owning a 22-12 overall record and a 19-8 record in games played in Evanston. The Panthers won Northwestern's last trip to Franklin Field, a 3-2 win on May 9, 2023.

QUICK LOOK AT NOTRE DAME
Notre Dame is 19-20 this season with an 8-16 mark in the Atlantic Coast Conference. The Fighting Irish dropped two of three to Boston College this past weekend and will play Central Michigan on Tuesday before welcoming the Panthers to South Bend, Indiana on Wednesday. Like the Panthers, Notre Dame has played LSU, UIC, and Duke in terms of common opponents and are 3-2 against those teams, while Milwaukee is 1-7.

Leading the way for the Irish is Bio Waters and his .366 batting average with 59 hits, including 19 for extra bases with 36 RBIs and 30 runs scored. Mark Qatrani is hitting .342 with a team-high 11 home runs and leads the team with 43 RBIs, while Drew Berland has a team-best 14 doubles with seven home runs and leads the squad with 40 runs scored. As a staff, Notre Dame has a 6.28 ERA over 331 innings with a 1.60 WHIP and 338 strikeouts.

Notre Dame is 1 1/2 games over Clemson for last in the 16-team ACC, and rank in the top half in several statistical categories including walks allowed per nine innings (2nd, 3.67), strikeout-to-walk ratio (5th, 2.50), and fielding percentage (6th, .975). Offensively, the team fares well with a .290 batting average, which is seventh in the league, while Notre Dame is also fourth in sacrifice bunts (13), and sixth in sacrifice flies (20), they are also seventh in the ACC in triples (10) and fourth in triples per game (0.26).

Former opponents in the Horizon League, albeit for one season in 1995 as the Midwestern Collegiate Conference, the Panthers dropped their lone league series to the Fighting Irish, winning the opener on April 7 before dropping both ends of a doubleheader the following day in South Bend. All told, Notre Dame is 10-3 in 13 all-time meetings with the last meeting coming on March 26, 2008. A few notable names appear in the box score from the most recent matchup including head coach Shaun Wegner, who was 1-for-1 coming off the bench for the Panthers, in the lineup for Notre Dame was future Major Leaguer and World Series Winner AJ Pollock, who was 4-for-5 with five runs scored, while Super Bowl Champion, Golden Tate, more known for his football skills and career with the Seattle Seahawks and Detroit Lions was 0-for-3 with three strikeouts.

QUICK LOOK AT UNLV
Entering the week with a 24-19 record, the Rebels are 7-11 in Mountain West play in the current iteration of the league. Five teams will depart for the Pac 12 next season, while UC Davis, Hawai'i, and Texas El Paso join the Mountain West in 2027. The Rebels played in-state foe Nevada this past weekend in Reno, dropping 2-of-3, and will play at Utah Tech on Tuesday before welcoming the Panthers to Earl E. Wilson Stadium this weekend.

The Panthers will face the full allotment of the Rebels top arms, scheduled to face Parker Dillhoff, Carson Lane, and Josh Donegan this weekend. Dillhoff was not with UNLV last season, and Donegan was at Long Beach State. The Panthers did not face Donegan as a freshman while at Long Beach State. Lane, however, faced the Panthers on Feb. 28 a season ago and struck out a season-high 10 batters, but did allow a two-run home run to Charlie Marion.

On offense, Drew Barragan leads the team with an impressive .391 average with 66 hits including 27 for extra bases. Barragan has a team-high six triples to go along eight home runs and leads the team with 43 runs scored; he is second to Marcos Rosales in runs scored with 52. Rosales is the other Rebel with an OPS above 1.000 and leads the team with 18 doubles and nine home runs. He has driven in 39 runs on the season.

As a team, UNLV has a .318 average which is good enough for second in the Mountain West and 12th best in the nation entering play this week. The Rebels lead the Mountain West with 469 hits and 386 runs, while the pitching staff tops the league in strikeouts per nine innings with 10.1. Despite the gaudy numbers, UNLV is just 7-11 in league play, placing them seventh in the nine-team conference. Nevada and Air Force are tied for the league lead at 12-6, with just five games separating the top seven teams.

This will be the second-straight season that UNLV and Milwaukee will meet on the baseball diamond, with the Panthers looking for their first-ever win against the Rebels. Last year UNLV swept a four-game set from Feb. 28 through Mar. 2, including a doubleheader on Mar. 1. Milwaukee was to host Purdue Fort Wayne this weekend at Franklin Field based on the original Horizon League schedule, however, due to the disbandment of the baseball program at PFW a void was left in the schedule, allowing Milwaukee to pick up a home series against Butler earlier this season, while also setting up this weekend's series in Las Vegas.

UP NEXT
Milwaukee returns home for a quick one-game stop to take on Valparaiso for its annual School Day matchup against the Beacons on May 5 at 11:00 a.m. Last season the program set a new attendance record with 2,234 in attendance and are anticipating a larger crown come Tuesday. The Panthers will visit UIC on Wednesday evening, before continuing to Youngstown State for a three-game set from May 8-10.

ON THESE DATES
April 28 – 20-10 Record; Streak: Lost 2; Last Win: 2017 vs. Oakland (4-3); vs. Northwestern (1-1, Doubleheader Split in 2010
April 29 – 11-14 Record; Streak: Won 1; Last Win: 2025 vs. Northern Illinois (18-15)
May 1 – 14-13 Record; Streak: Won 1; Last Win: 2024 vs. Northern Illinois (6-5)
May 2 – 15-14 Record; Streak: Won 1; Last Win: 2025 vs. Northen Kentucky (5-4)
May 3 –11-12 Record; Streak Lost 3; Last Win: 2016 vs. Chicago State (6-2)

WINNING STREAK
Milwaukee posted an eight-game winning streak beginning with the series finale against Oakland on Apr. 12 through the team's Apr. 25 win at home against Wright State. The eighth-game streak was tied for the fourth longest winning streak in program history. Milwaukee had a record 13-game winning streak in 2002, while recording a pair of nine-game winning streaks during the 2001 campaign.

SHUTOUT WINS
On Apr. 12, the Panthers recorded their first shutout win of the season with 12-0 seven-inning victory at Oakland. It was the team's first shutout win since their previous series finale at Oakland, when Milwaukee finished the regular season with an 11-0 victory over the Golden Grizzlies on May 17, 2025. Milwaukee recorded its second shutout of the season against Wright State on Apr. 25, which was the first time that the Raiders had been shutout in a Horizon League contest since May 19, 2022.

HOME COOKING
Over the last 21 seasons (2005-25), Milwaukee has taken "home field advantage" to another level, posting winning home records in all but two seasons (8-14 in 2022; 0-0 in 2020). The Panthers went unbeaten at home in 2013 (13-0) and have posted three straight 12-7 home records (2023-25).

In 2026, Milwaukee is 8-5 in home games with four games remaining on the home slate.

COMEBACK WINS
Milwaukee erased an 8-0 first-inning deficit against Northern Kentucky on March 15 and did so again on Apr. 21, trailing St. Thomas by an 8-0 score through 6 1/2 innings, before scoring nine unanswered between the seventh and eighth innings to win, 9-8. The two are now tied for the second-largest comebacks in the last 20 seasons (since 2007).

The largest came on Apr. 15, 2015, when the Panthers trailed Chicago State 10-1 before outscoring the Cougars 14-1 the rest of the way, including an 11-run seventh inning, to win 15-11.

SWEEP OF THE NORSE
With its sweep of Northern Kentucky this past weekend, Milwaukee has now won 12 series against the Norse as Horizon League opponents. After finishing the sweep on Sunday, the Panthers now have swept the Norse four times in those 12 series wins. It was Milwaukee's first sweep of Northern Kentucky since the 2019 season.

The only active Horizon League team that Milwaukee has swept more than Northern Kentucky is Youngstown State, whom the Panthers have swept eight times in program history.

O'CONNELL ON THE RUN
With 32 stolen bases on the season, Dylan O'Connell has the second most stolen bases in a single season by a Milwaukee player. Luke Meeteer owns the record with 37 stolen bases during the 2015 season.

With four stolen bases against Oakland on Apr. 12, O'Connell tied the Milwaukee program record for steals in a game. He later stole five bases in Thursday's game against Northern Kentucky to set a new single-game record. His five stolen bases in a game are the second-most in all of Division I baseball this season, with Alex Laird of Bowling Green recording seven of Akron on Apr. 3.

TEAM STEALS
Milwaukee has 90 stolen bases on the season as a team, which is the fourth-most in the program's history. Next on the list is 93, currently third, while the program record is 103 stolen bases set during the 2016 season.

EXTRA-BASE HITS
Milwaukee has recorded at least one extra-base hit in all but two games this season to lead all Horizon League programs. The exceptions were March 10 at Purdue and March 14 at Northern Kentucky.

Through games played on April 26, Northern Kentucky has been held without an extra-base hit on three occasions, followed by Oakland, Youngstown State and Wright State (four each).

A RARE MONDAY
The team's win at Central Michigan on Apr. 13 was the team's first game on a Monday since the 2023 season, when the Panthers defeated Division III Carroll on Apr. 10, at Franklin Field.

The Panthers played a neutral site matchup against Eastern Michigan in Winter Haven, Fla. in 2017 and won, 15-4. While the last time Milwaukee played a true road game on a Monday was on Mar. 4, 2013, splitting a doubleheader at Evansville with a 5-4 win in the opener before falling 7-3 in game two.

KIBLER SLAMS
With a grand slam in Monday's win over Central Michigan, Dominic Kibler now has two grand slams this season after hitting one against Butler on Mar. 28. He is the first Panther with multiple grand slams in a single season since Carson Hansen in 2024, when he had slams against Northern Kentucky at home on both Apr. 26, and in game two of a doubleheader on Apr. 27.

GLUSICK PUSHING FRESHMAN MARKS
With two home runs, 16 RBIs, and five stolen bases, freshman Max Glusick is pushing the top-five marks in the freshman record book. He needs one home run to create a four-way tie for third, six more RBIs to tie for fifth, and three more stolen bases to tie for fifth among all-time first-year Panthers.

LONGEST GAMES SINCE 2004 (BY INNING)
Since 2004, Milwaukee has played seven games of 13+ innings of play and is 5-2 in those contests:
• March 20, 2016 at Illinois State – Win, 4-1 (18 Innings)
• March 15, 2026 at Northern Kentucky – Win, 16-10 (14 Innings)
• May 22, 2010 vs. Youngstown State – Win, 8-7 (14 Innings)
• May 21, 2008 vs. Cleveland State – Win, 10-7 (14 Innings, Horizon League Tournament)
• March 3, 2017 at Evansville – Win, 7-5 (13 Innings)
• May 16, 2024 vs. Wright State – Loss, 4-2 (13 Innings)
• May 15, 2008 vs. Youngstown State – Loss, 5-4 (13 Innings, Miller Park)

POWER RACE
Milwaukee has slugged 36 home runs this season as a team, led by Dylan O'Connell with eight.

Breakdown by class:
• Seniors: 9 (Marion 4, Ross 3, Spence 2)
• Juniors: 16; (O'Connell 8, Kibler 6, Holmes 2)
• Sophomores: 9; (Hadley VI 5, Horn 3, Palkowski 1)
• Freshmen: 2; (Glusick 2)

Milwaukee has hit three grand slam this season: Hadley VI, Feb. 21 at Duke; Kibler, Mar. 28 vs. Butler; Kibler, Apr. 13 at Central Michigan.

MULTI-HOME RUN GAME
Milwaukee had back-to-back weekends with a player recording a multi-home run game, Joey Spence (March 13 at Northern Kentucky) and Charlie Marion (March 22 at Wright State).

Spence became the 72nd player in program history to accomplish the feat, with Marion becoming the 73rd. The last player with multiple multi-homer games in a season was Nate DeYoung in 2022.

FIRST DIVISION I HITS
Six Panthers have already recorded their first career hits at the Division I level…
• Ryan Lemm, February 15 at LSU (Single)
• Max Glusick, February 15 at LSU (Single)
• Peter Visconti II, March 4 at Minnesota (Single)
• Connor Bozak, March 6 at Southeast Missouri (Single)
• Connor Harvie, March 10 at Purdue (Single)
• Sotaro Ishida, March 15 at Northern Kentucky (Double)

HIT BY A PITCHER
Sotaro Ishida recorded a double against Northern Kentucky on March 15, becoming the first pitcher to collect a hit in a game since Camden Kuhnke did so at Wright State on March 17, 2024.

CLEAN UP THE DEFENSE
Milwaukee has a .955 fielding percentage as a team and are ranked 286th of 304 Division I baseball teams in 2026 entering play this week.

IN EXTRA INNINGS
Milwaukee is 2-0 in extra innings in 2026 (1-3 in 2025) and holds an 19-19-1 record in extra-inning games since 2015.

PRESEASON POLL
Milwaukee was picked second in the Horizon League preseason poll with 18 points. Wright State was selected first with 24 points and four first-place votes. Northern Kentucky, Youngstown State, and Oakland round out the league.

THE MAMMOTH VOID
Non-conference games added to offset the departure of Purdue Fort Wayne for the remainder of the season:
• May 1-3 – Milwaukee at UNLV
• May 8-10 – Oakland at Notre Dame
• May 14-16 – Northern Kentucky at USC Upstate

ON THE HORIZON
Northern Illinois will join the Horizon League on July 1, 2026, and become a full-time baseball member beginning with the 2027 season.