Cathedral rallies to sweep MVL in baseball doubleheader

In the first game, Greyhounds right-hander Colin Anderson scattered five hits in a 2-0 win. Game 2 saw Cathedral (9-3, 8-3) plate three runs in the bottom of the fourth for a 4-3 win.

“We got two nice wins today,” Cathedral head coach Alan Woitas said. “Their pitchers kept us off-balance both games. But we had some timely hitting today with two outs.

“I think we scored all six of our runs today with two outs and both of those rallies came after two were out. So credit our kids to grind out the at-bats and find ways to push runs across.”

Chargers head coach Jim Buboltz, who saw his team drop to 5-8 overall and 4-7 overall, felt that his team is close.

Staff photo by Travis Rosenau
New Ulm Cathedral’s Rylan Koopmann (8) slides into home and beats the tag of Minnesota Valley Lutheran catcher Kaden Peterson during the second game of a Tomahawk Conference baseball doubleheader on Wednesday at Mueller Park in New Ulm.

“We have to make that one play,” Buboltz said. “And right now we are not making it. We need that one key hit. We did that in the second game and we gave it right back to them on the defensive side and that is too bad.”

In the first game, Anderson struck out 10 and scattered five hits.

Bradyn Kube took the pitching loss for MVL. He also allowed five hits and struck out five.

Logan Mielke had three hits for Cathedral.

Kube had two hits for the Chargers.

The Greyhounds’ runs in the game came in the top of the sixth inning after two were out and were both unearned.

Brock Wellmann singled to left before Mielke got his third single of the game to center.

Elliott Schabert’s infield grounder was misplayed for an error that allowed Wellmann to score. A balk allowed the second run to score.

“We are hurting ourselves,” Buboltz said. “I told our team that right now we are our biggest enemy.”

The Chargers also stranded nine runners on base in the game, including leaving the bases loaded in the sixth.

“When we get guys on base we need to calm ourselves down and put the bat on the ball,” Buboltz said.

In Game 2, the Chargers erased a 1-0 Cathedral lead in the top of the fourth with three runs.

But the Greyhounds came back with three runs in the bottom of the inning and held on for a 4-3 win.

Caleb Forstner got the win for Cathedral, going four innings. Jake Finstad got the save.

Josh Vander Plas took the loss for the Chargers.

Cathedral took a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first when Anderson singled and came around to score on a Levi Franta single.

In the top of the fourth, the Chargers took their first lead of the day with three runs.

Connor Bode and Kaden Peterson singled.

Both moved up on a double steal before a Kube single plated Bode. Vander Plas followed with a two-run double for a 3-1 MVL lead.

Cathedral responded with three runs of its own after two outs.

Wellmann singled and Mielke dropped a bloop single to center.

A Schabert double scored two to tie the game.

Joey Schugel then singled in the eventual game-winning run.

“It was great to see us respond like that,” Woitas said. “They put together a nice inning, but we came back and got the momentum back on our side, and Jake did a fantastic job. After the loss to Sleepy Eye, it was nice to get back and get two [wins] today and win the week.”

Buboltz said that his team is a better team now even though they are losing games.

The Chargers are at Wabasso on Monday, with the Greyhounds hosting Mankato Loyola on Tuesday.

Both games are at 5 p.m.