Beating the Tigers, who entered Thursday’s doubleheader with a perfect 10-0 Tomahawk record, wasn’t going to be easy. But with good defense, steady arms and timely hitting, the Greyhounds managed to pull out both wins, winning the first game 4-1 and the second 4-0 to clinch the Tomahawk.

The Greyhounds will now represent the Tomahawk Division in the Tomahawk-Valley Conference championship at 7 p.m. Thursday against Cleveland, the Valley’s champion.

“I think we are just proud of the way our kids played today,” Cathedral head coach Alan Woitas said. “Springfield’s a very good baseball team. Obviously they’ve had a ton of success and they’re going to be a tough out come section tournament time. But we played really good defense and we were able to get timely hitting. We just kind of really battled at the plate against two really good pitchers and consistently put the ball in play and put some pressure on their defense.”

GAME 1

Staff photo by Travis Rosenau New Ulm Cathedral’s Ethan Blekestad runs to first while Springfield’s Kade Nachreiner (5) tries to pick the ball up on the line during the first game of a Tomahawk Division baseball doubleheader at Riverside Park in Springfield on Thursday.

The Tigers were bit by the error bug for the second time in the last seven days after committing four in their first loss of the season Saturday against Luverne. Against the Greyhounds in Game 1, the Tigers had four early errors and two of them leading to two unearned runs off Springfield’s left-handed starting pitcher Noah Neperman.

After Jake Finstad was hit by a pitch to lead off the opener, back-to-back groundouts were followed with a walk to Schabert. A grounder by Alex Portner to second led to an error that scored Finstad. The Greyhounds got two more runs in the third, one on another groundout by Portner and another on a two-out liner to right by Schugel that ended up in another error and a 3-0 Cathedral lead. Another error followed that in the inning, but the Tigers were able to avoid any more damage after a strikeout.

The Tigers got a run back in the fifth when Jackson Ludewig grounded out to score Brayden Sturm, who singled to lead off.

Adiel Trevino pitched the final two innings, allowing a run in the top of the sixth on an RBI single by Colin Anderson. Anderson also pitched six innings of one-hit ball in the win, striking out five while walking three.

Neperman finished up going 5 2/3 innings, allowing five hits and two walks for four runs, two earned, while fanning two.

Caleb Forstner was 3 for 4 at the plate for the Greyhounds in Game 1, while Schugel was 2 for 4. Trevino was 1 for 1 with a walk to lead Springfield in the opener, while Sturm was 1 for 2 and Ludewig added a double.

GAME 2

In what was a tightly-contested pitchers’ duel for five innings in the second game of the evening, the Greyhounds broke things open in the sixth inning for four runs off starting right-hander Kade Nachreiner.

The Greyhounds opened their half of that inning with a single by Elijah Rieser, who got sac-bunted to second by Finstad. Forstner was hit by a pitch before Anderson singled to put runners on at every base. Schabert then singled on a grounder into right field to score Rieser and Forstner for a 2-0 lead. Portner reached on an error in left that scored another run before Schugel singled on a fly ball to center to make it 4-0.

Nachreiner took the Game 2 loss in six innings, allowing five hits and a walk for four runs, two earned.

Finstad got the complete-game shutout on the mound in Game 2, allowing five hits and no walks while striking out two.

Rieser and Schabert both went 1 for 2 in Game 2 to lead Cathedral the plate.

Noah Mueller had a pinch-hit single in the fifth for Springfield that nearly got his team on the board. His base hit came on a grounder to third after a leadoff double by Trevino and a single by Brecken Heiling. Greyhounds third baseman Ethan Blekestad threw home after fielding the infield single and got Trevino out at home for the first out of the inning. Back-to-back flyouts then ended Springfield’s best chance to score.

“Colin and Jake are gamers,” Woitas said. “They want to pitch in these types of games, they want to pitch against quality opponents. They both love to compete and they did that tonight. They got themselves out of some jams in both games. And, like I said, defensively behind them, we played really well, made a ton of above-average plays to help get those outs and get them out of innings, too.”

BUSY WEEK AHEAD

The Greyhounds will now add another game to a schedule next week that already had five games on it. Monday the Greyhounds take on New Ulm rival Minnesota Valley Lutheran before hosting BOLD on Tuesday. Thursday is the Tomahawk-Valley title game with Cleveland at Johnson Park and Friday the Greyhounds host Janesville-Waldorf-Pemberton. On Saturday, Cathedral is at ISG Field in Mankato to play two games, one against Triton and one against Lake City.

The Greyhounds (13-1, 11-1) defeated Cleveland earlier this season on April 15 at home 5-1.

“They’re a good team, they’ve got two really good pitchers,” Woitas said. “Their top half of the lineup is pretty good, really good catcher, so it’ll be a good game Thursday and it puts us in a really busy week. … So we’re going to half to lean on a lot of different arms and make sure we don’t overextend anyone going into playoffs the following week.”

The Tigers (13-3, 10-2) will get a little more rest next week as they have one game on the schedule and host Windom Area on Monday.