Greyhounds sweep doubleheader with Rabbits

Staff photo by Ari Selvey
New Ulm Cathedral’s Brock Wellmann takes a lead during a Tomahawk Conference baseball game against Wabasso Thursday at Johnson Park in New Ulm.

NEW ULM — New Ulm Cathedral erupted for eight runs in the top of the fifth inning to break open a close 4-1 game and went on to down Wabasso 12-1 Thursday in the second game of a Tomahawk Conference doubleheader at Johnson Park.

Cathedral took the opener 10-7.

The second game was stopped after five innings because of the 10-run lead rule.

Caleb Fostner got the win for the Greyhounds in Game 2, now 6-2 overall and 4-2 in the conference. He scattered three hits and struck out five.

Joe Liebl took the Game 2 mound loss for the Rabbits (0-5, 0-5). He went four innings and was charged with four runs.

Colin Anderson had two hits for the Greyhounds with Levi Franta, Forstner, Logan Mielke and Eric Schabert each driving in two runs. Schabert had a double.

“Caleb did a fantastic job for us,” Cathedral head coach Alan Woitas said. “And we made some really nice defensive plays behind him. When you turn three double plays behind him that is a credit to your defense.But Caleb was also constantly ahead of hitters in the game and keeping the pace of play going.”

Cathedral, which hosts GFW next Thursday in a doubleheader, took a 2-0 lead on the Rabbits in the top of the second on walks to Brock Wellmann and Schabert and a Jake Finstad single. Schabert later scored on one of four errors in the game by Wabasso.

The Rabbits got their only run off of Forstner in the bottom of the inning on a double play.

Cathedral added two more runs in the third on a Joey Schugel sacrifice fly, two more errors and a hit batsman.

In the top of the fifth, Cathedral, which had stranded nine runners on base in the first four innings, salted the game away as they sent 12 men to the plate, scoring eight runs off of reliever Jaxson Wagner. Schugel walked and was sacrificed to second by Schabert. Wagner walked Finstad and Matt Seidl to load the bases before Franta singled in two runs for a 6-1 lead. An Anderson infield single and a Forstner two-run single upped the lead to 8-1.

Logan Mielke kept the inning going with a two-run single before Schabert doubled in two more.

“We had a lot of different guys contributing in the game,” Woitas said, “And that is kind of our strength — we do not have to rely on one guy. We feel that we have really good depth in our lineup.”

In the opener, Colin Anderson got the win. He went 4 1/3 innings and fanned seven and was charged with six runs. Jake Finstad went the final 1 2/3 innings.

Kaysen Harms took the loss for Wabasso. He went 3 2/3 innings and allowed eight runs.

Wabasso also had seven errors in the game.

Finstad had two hits with Franta and Forstner each driving in two runs.

“We found a way to win that [first] game,” Woitas said. “It is hard to play your best baseball 20 games throughout the year. We were a little sloppy — we did not have our best at-bats and Colin grinded it out on the mound and Jake did a nice job in relief. But we found a way to win.”

Cathedral and Wabasso both plated two runs in the first inning before the Greyhounds took a 5-2 lead in the second on just one hit but aided by three Wabasso errors.

Cathedral pushed across five more runs in the fourth, with two of the runs coming on a Franta single.

But Wabasso scored four times in the fifth, with two of the runs coming off of the bat of Harms on a single.

Wabasso added its final run of the game in the top of the sixth on a fielder’s choice.

“It was nice to get two wins today after we dropped a game on Monday,” Woitas said. “Now we look forward to next week.”