Staff photo by Travis Rosenau Springfield Legion Post 257’s Brendon Buerkle collides with Forest Lake third baseman Charlie Mohr on a slide into third on Friday in Upper Midwest Classic baseball action in Essig.

ESSIG — When a team collects 14 hits during a baseball game, it more often than not leads to a win for that team.

But enough errors can spoil any hit parade.

The Springfield Legion Post 257 baseball team realized that in its second game of the Upper Midwest Classic on Friday, falling 13-8 to Forest Lake at Essig Ballpark.

Springfield outhit Forest Lake 14-10 but committed seven errors in the loss, with errors hurting the most during a third inning that saw Forest Lake score seven runs.

“I thought our offense and putting the ball in play was good,” Springfield coach Henry Scheitel said. “Obviously the errors on the scoreboard do not look very pretty. Most of those plays were just routine plays that we didn’t make. If you look at the scoreboard, it’s just that one [third] inning that hurt us. If you take off that one inning, we win the ballgame. Making the routine plays is what the good teams do to win and we didn’t do that today.”

Springfield got on the board first in the bottom of the first inning after an RBI single from Brendon Buerkle scored Ashtin Johnson. It went up 2-0 in the second on an RBI double to left by Johnson to score Jakob Nachreiner, who singled to left earlier.

But after two strong innings by Springfield starting pitcher Sam Rummel, Rummel ran into trouble in the third in the form of hits and errors. After getting the first out of the third on a groundout, Rummel walked one and gave up three consecutive singles to have Forest Lake down 2-1.

A dropped fly ball in center field scored another two runs and gave Forest Lake the lead. An error at shortstop allowed another run to score.

A single and a bases-loaded walk gave Forest Lake a 5-2 lead, while two more errors followed that to help Forest Lake take a 7-2 lead.

Springfield wasn’t going to roll over in the bottom of the third, scoring one run on an error, one run on a sac fly by Danny Rogotzke and another run on an RBI bunt single from MaCoy Krick to trail 7-5.

Rummel, who ended up taking the loss in 3 1/3 innings, was relieved by Noah Neperman in the fourth after giving up a hit and three consecutive walks for an 8-5 deficit. Neperman got a strikeout to end the inning.

Forest Lake went up 9-5 in the fifth on a sac fly from Remy Keis before Springfield got an RBI single from Luke Boyle and an RBI double from Kade Nachreiner in the bottom of the sixth to trail 9-7.

Three hits and another error helped Forest Lake pull ahead 13-7 in the top of the seventh. Springfield scored once more in the bottom half of the inning on an RBI single from Buerkle to score Krick, who reached on a double.

Buerkle ended up leading Springfield at the plate, going 4 for 4 with a run scored. Krick was 3 for 4.

Gavin Goehner was 3 for 4 with an RBI for Forest Lake, while Nolan Dumonceaux was 3 for 5 with two doubles and an RBI.

Springfield also dropped a 9-1 game earlier in the day to Mankato National. Johnson and Tate Mathiowetz each had a single for Springfield’s lone hits in that game, while Jakob Nachreiner had an RBI.

Scheitel said that the team is without some of its top leaders for the UMC, which has been one obstacle to overcome.

“We are missing three or four of our top players,” Scheitel said. “And honestly the guys that we had out here today, we had two seniors playing and the rest are ninth and 10th-graders, so there are a lot of kids that were playing JV this year that are getting a chance to play in legion ball. Putting them in big positions like these tournaments that we do, we play Division 2 and this is a Division 1 tournament, so we’re seeing a lot of good competition, which is good for them, and I would say that some of them are ready and some aren’t quite there yet. But it’s good experience for all the kids, so that’s fun to watch.”

Springfield will play against Chaska at noon Saturday at Mueller Park next on the third day of the UMC. Scheitel said he plans to start Kade Nachreiner on the mound for that game.