Staff photo by Steve Muscatello Christopher Pipes of the Mankato National slides into home under the tag of New Ulm Legion Gold starting pitcher Cooper Forbrook during a playoff game Thursday in Sleepy Eye. For more photos of this event go to cu.nujournal.com

SLEEPY EYE — New Ulm Gold nearly entered Friday’s action of the Division I, Substate 2 Legion baseball tournament undefeated.

However, New Ulm fell short of its comeback attempt against top-seeded Mankato National in losing 11-10 on Thursday at Sleepy Eye Ballpark.

Gold beat Jordan 3-1 on Thursday morning in Sleepy Eye to reach the winner’s bracket finals.

In the first game, Cole Wellmann powered through to a complete-game win with eight strikeouts.

Wellmann began the game having retired 10-straight batters — during which he tallied six strikeouts — before yielding a single to Jon Draheim in the top of the fourth inning. Ryan Friedges soon batted in Draheim for Post 3’s lone run of the game, as Wellmann’s defense worked behind him with errorless ball in scattering six total hits.

“We had four or five errors last night [in a 13-3, eight-inning win against Sleepy Eye], but it was nice to — especially pitching — have my defense play solid like they can,” Wellmann said. “It was really nice.”

Post 132 had some base running issues that stalled its run production with two runners caught stealing, two others caught off base and one thrown out at third base after a sacrifice fly to center field.

Without those miscues, the game might not have been as close as it was.

“We like to be aggressive and sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn’t,” Wellmann said. “They picked up on our mistakes, but I don’t mind being aggressive.”

In the second game, New Ulm persisted against a powerful offensive display by Mankato with three runs in both the third and sixth innings before scoring four in the top of the ninth to pull to within 11-10.

However, Michael Middlekamp shut the door on Gold in five pitches, catching Cooper Yackley looking and forcing Kasey Kuck to fly out to right field for the final outs.

Luke Sellner got the win for National in 6 2/3 innings, exhausting his mandated 120-pitch pitch-count in that span.

Alex Lund got the loss in place of Cooper Forbrook, who pitched 3 1/3 innings. Andrew Peters pitched the final inning and allowed two earned runs.

New Ulm plays Mankato American in an elimination game at 5 p.m. Friday in Sleepy Eye. If Mankato National wins its 8 p.m. game, it will need to lose twice on Saturday to be denied a state tournament berth.

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Winner’s Bracket Semifinals

Jordan 000 100 000 — 1 7 3

NUG 100 100 10x — 3 5 0

Lambrecht and Draheim; Wellmann and Ranweiler.

W – Wellmann (N) 9 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 8 K, 100 pitches

L – Lambrecht (J) 8 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 1 K, 91 pitches

Leading hitters – Jordan: Draheim 1-4 1 R 1 K, R Friedges 2-4 1 RBI, Westman 2-4 1 K; NUG: Hoffmann 1-3 1 R, Ranweiler 1-3 1 RBI 1 BB 1 K, Kuck 1-2 1 R 1 HP, Peters 1-3 1 RBI.

Winner’s Bracket Finals

NUG 003 003 004 — 10 16 4

MN 220 111 04x — 11 12 3

Forbrook, Lund (4), Peters (8) and Ranweiler; Sellner, Yokiel (7), Furst (9), Middlekamp (9) and Meidl.

W – Sellner (M) 6 2/3 IP, 12 H, 6 R, 4 ER, 2 BB, 3 K, 120 pitches

L – Lund (N) 3 2/3 IP, 4 H, 4 R, 3 ER, 2 BB, 3 K, 66 pitches

Sv – Middlekamp (M) 2/3 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 1 K, 5 pitches

ND – Forbrook (N) 3 1/3 IP, 7 H, 5 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 1 K, 49 pitches

Leading hitters – NUG: Hoffmann 3-6 1 R, Ranweiler 3-6 2 RBI 1 R 2 K, Wellmann 3-4 2 RBI 1 HP, Kuck 1-6 2 RBI 2B, N Fischer 2-5 1 RBI 2B; MN: Gratz 2-4 2 R 1 BB 1 K, Yokiel 2-4 2 R 1 BB, Scott 2-4 2 RBI, Haley 2-3 2 RBI 1 R 2B, Rollings 3-5 2 RBI 2 R 1 K.