Photo by Sam Thiel Marshall’s Cole Felcyn reacts after tagging a New Ulm baserunner during their game on Thursday. Felcyn would get the out on the play, but the Eagles defeated Marshall 7-3.

MARSHALL — After earning its first pair of victories over the weekend, the Marshall baseball team returned home looking to keep the momentum going against New Ulm. Marshall found itself in a tight battle early on against the Eagles, but five runs in the final two innings propelled New Ulm to a 7-3 victory on Thursday at Legion Field.

Marshall coach Chace Pollock felt they were able to battle early on against a tough opponent but added New Ulm made the right adjustments late.

“It was a good pitcher from New Ulm and our guys did a nice job battling; they’re a good team, a well-coached team and do a lot of things right and it just wasn’t our night,” Pollock said.

Both sides had chances to get on the board right away but couldn’t take advantage, as the game remained scoreless through two and a half innings. Marshall then got things started on the offensive end when Connor Neubeck drilled a leadoff double before Josh Baker connected on an RBI single to make it 1-0 after three, but New Ulm answered with a run on a wild pitch the next half-inning to tie things up at 1-1.

The Eagles would use a leadoff walk and two stolen bases to put a runner in scoring position in the fifth before scoring on a wild pitch to take a 2-1 lead, but Marshall was right there to answer, as Neubeck reached on a dropped third strike before Baker smacked a two-out triple to right to tie it again at 2-2.

New Ulm responded with another walk and a single to start the sixth inning before plating a run on an error. The Eagles then added two more runs on the next at-bat on a single to push their lead to 5-2. New Ulm wasn’t done there, getting aboard on a leadoff single and a Marshall error in the seventh before an RBI single and another error scored two more runs to extend the Eagles’ advantage to 7-2.

Marshall would get a walk from Jacob Hughes and an RBI double by Neubeck to make it 7-3 in the bottom of the inning, but couldn’t get any closer.

Baker led Marshall with two hits and two RBI while Neubeck added two hits and an RBI and Chase Douglas and Brock Schultz each had a hit.

Pollock said they were able to piece together some quality at-bats throughout the game and hopes they can get more into a rhythm on offense as the season progresses.

“We put together some good at-bats and some guys had some really good swings on the ball,” Pollock said. “Connor hit the ball all over the park and some other guys had some good at-bats and had nothing to show for it but worked the zone; once we start to get more in a rhythm here and get moving, I expect our bats to continue to get better.”

Charlie Jacobson took the loss on the mound, throwing five innings while allowing four runs on four hits and struck out nine.

“Charlie did a great job,” Pollock said. He kind of faded late there as his pitches increased, but he did a great job and gave us a chance to win for sure.”

Up next

Marshall (2-2) will face Worthington today at 4:30 p.m. Pollock said they just need to continue to learn from their mistakes and move in a positive direction.

“We’ve got to learn from it; you learn more when you lose than you do when you win, so hopefully we can get better at that,” Pollock said. “This was better than our game against Mankato West, so it’s a step in the right direction but we still need to continue to close the gap here as we move forward.”

New Ulm 7, Marshall 3

New Ulm 000 113 2 – 7 8 1

Marshall 001 010 1 – 3 6 3

Hitting: Marshall (Douglas 1-4; Baker 2-4, 2 RBI; Schultz 1-3; Neubeck 2-3, RBI).

Pitching (IP-R-ER-H-BB-SO): Marshall (Jacobson 5-4-3-4-6-9; Bouwman 2-3-3-6-2-3).