The win moves New Ulm on to a 1:30 p.m. elimination bracket game at Dick Seltz Field on Friday.

Levi Franta was 3 for 4 with a home run and four RBIs to lead VFW Gold, while Zach Riederer was 3 for 4 with an RBI and Jake Finstad was 2 for 3 with an RBI. Logan Mielke doubled also for New Ulm.

New Ulm head coach Collin Helget said hie was happy with how his team and offense responded against Winona.

“There were a couple of key spots where guys came up with good hits, good at-bats, put the ball in play,” Helget said. “And Levi, he hit the ball really well tonight. He squared just about everything up, obviously he hit the home run and it was way gone, it was a no-doubter. So it’s good to see everybody, top to bottom, squaring up, putting the ball in play.”

Staff photo by Travis Rosenau Above: New Ulm VFW Gold starting pitcher Kaden Larson pitches during a VFW Baseball State Tournament game with Duluth East on Thursday at Dick Seltz Field in Austin.

Blaine Olson got the win in five innings on the mound, striking out three while giving up six walks and four hits for one earned run. Riederer pitched two innings in relief and allowed three earned runs.

After seven errors hurt New Ulm earlier in the day in its 8-1 loss to Duluth East, New Ulm had a perfect end of the night in the field and didn’t commit a single error.

“After the first game, obviously it was tough, it was kind of a struggle all the way around,” Helget said. “We ran into a good pitcher, we kicked the ball around, one mistake led to the next. After that game, I ultimately told them, ‘You know, guys, there’s not a whole lot to say after something like this. I think we all know what we did wrong, what we can do better. We’ve got to forget about it because we’ve got another one tonight. And if we want to keep moving on in this tournament, yes, obviously the road got harder, we have enough pitching to do it. But we’re going to have to forget about it and regroup and come back ready to play.’ And tonight before the game, you could tell the attitudes were up, the spirits were high and they came out right away ready to play a ballgame.”

In VFW Gold’s loss, Duluth East starting pitcher Joe Nick also kept New Ulm at bay with five solid innings.

Nick held VFW Gold to two hits while striking out six in the win.

VFW Gold starter Kaden Larson pitched three innings in the loss and struck out one while giving up five hits. He gave up five runs, but just two of them were earned.

Four of New Ulm’s seven errors happened while Larson was on the mound.

Mielke pitched two innings in relief and got out of a jam in the fourth after a sac fly, a strikeout and a groundout. Kaden Peterson pitched the final two innings for New Ulm.

Duluth East took a 2-0 lead in the the first after a two-out single by Nick and an error at third base allowed Jack Teachworth to reach. Another two errors followed that which allowed Duluth to bring two runs across.

Nick was getting his fastball by VFW Gold hitters until Olson singled to left-center in the third for New Ulm’s first hit. Duluth East scored three more runs in the fourth inning on a wild pitch, an RBI single by Peyton Call and a sac fly off the bat of Nick.

Duluth East added three more runs on no hits and three errors in the top of the fifth to go up 8-0. Adam Wiltscheck got VFW Gold’s second hit of the game on a out-out single in the bottom of the inning, but Nick got back-to-back strikeouts to end the New Ulm threat.

Riederer tripled in the seventh inning and later scored on an error for New Ulm’s lone run.