sports@nujournal.com

MANKATO — For the second year in a row, the New Ulm Junior Legion Gold baseball team is headed to the DI state tournament.

Taking on No. 2 Marshall in the Sub-State G championship Saturday, top-seeded New Ulm jumped out to an early lead despite allowing a first-inning run to Marshall and coasted to victory from there, winning 11-1 behind a complete-game pitching performance from Josh Forstner in a five-inning win.

“I’m proud of us. I’m proud of the way that we can work together, work as a team and hit the ball hard. Even if somebody’s not having the best game, we pick each other up,” Josh Forstner said.

Photo by Jake McNeill New Ulm Junior Legion Gold third baseman Evan Blekestad prepares to make a throw to first during the DI Sub-State G Junior Legion Baseball Tournament title game against Marshall on Saturday at Wolverton Field in Mankato.

Coming out of the winners bracket, New Ulm had the advantage of needing just one win to clinch the sub-state title while Marshall would have needed to beat New Ulm twice in a row, with a second game being played Sunday if Marshall won the first. Still, New Ulm had no intention of returning to Wolverton Field for another day.

“It’s been a long week and it’s been a long season, but you just want to take care of it as soon as you can,” New Ulm head coach Mike Anderson said. “Why put our backs against the wall when they’re not right now? It was really good to come out and just get a win. Josh Came out and really just put us close on his back, and threw strikes, and was competitive.”

New Ulm’s bats exploded in the bottom of the first to string together six runs on just two hits. An Alex Portner walk and a Hunter Larson single put runners on the corners, and Portner scored the tying run on a passed ball.

After Tanner Backer was hit by a pitch, Evan Blekestad grounded into a fielder’s choice to score Larson as Marshall got the first out of the inning. Levi Hopp drilled an RBI double to make the score 3-1, prompting Marshall to make a pitching change and put Tyler Kraft on the mound for Noah Frazee.

Back-to-back walks to Josh Forstner and Eli Anderson loaded the bases when a passed ball scored one run, and two more scored when Mitchell Hopp reached on an error before Kraft got out of the inning with a pair of ground outs.

Photo by Jake McNeill New Ulm Junior Legion Gold pitcher Josh Forstner catches a pop up in the DI Sub-State G Junior Legion Baseball Tournament title game against Marshall on Saturday at Wolverton Field in Mankato.

Forstner pitched all five innings without allowing an earned run. He finished with two strikeouts while giving up four hits and no walks.

Marshall worked its way onto the scoreboard in the top of the first by taking advantage of a pair of New Ulm errors. Cannon Craigmile hit a grounder and reached base on a throwing error, and scored the go-ahead run when Noah Pieper reached base on another error.

Black went on to load the bases on an Ethan Boeck single and Jackson Sirovy getting hit by a pitch, but a pop out left all three runners stranded and never got past second base for the remainder of the game.

“I tried to hit my spots, hit the corners, and mix it up a little bit with the change up,” Josh Forstner said of his success over the game’s final four innings, saying that keeping Marshall off-balance was among his primary objectives.

New Ulm closed out the mercy-rule win with four fifth-inning runs. Levi Hopp and Eli Anderson got on base with a single and a walk. Levi Hopp went on to score the inning’s first run on a Mitchell Hopp single, though Hopp was thrown out trying to stretch the hit into a double.

The rally continued with a Collin Forstner RBI double and a Porter RBI single. Portner then stole second and scored the clinching run on a Larson single.

Levi Hopp finished with a game-high three hits while Mitchell Hopp drove in four RBIs on a pair of singles. Larson also singled twice and drove in an RBI.

Anderson singled to lead off the third, stole second and gave New Ulm an insurance run by scoring on a Mitchell Hopp single to left field to give New Ulm a six-run cushion.

Frazee was charged with the loss for Marshall after giving up four earned runs on two hits and two walks while getting one out in his start. Kraft pitched the remainder of the game, giving up five earned runs on eight hits and three walks over 4 1/3.

Marshall finished the day with five hits to New Ulm’s nine, with two of Marshall’s hits coming on a double and a single from Pieper.

BREWING SUCCESS

New Ulm advanced to the sub-state finals in the Legion, Junior Legion and VFW tournaments this year, with the Legion and Junior Legion teams both winning to advance to the state tournament. The results show growth in New Ulm’s development of baseball talent and the community, parents and players should be proud of where New Ulm is now, coach Anderson said.

“When you’ve got a community like New Ulm that is a baseball community, they just eat, sleep and drink it [baseball],” Anderson said. “When I look at these three groups, the to-be seniors in New Ulm had Kevin Briggs growing up. The to-be juniors had Jay Backer as one of their coaches. The to-be sophomores had Corey Ranweiler involved in the group. When you’ve got good baseball dads and good baseball culture, they’re making it easy on us as coaches to have success.”

UP NEXT

New Ulm will now await seeding for the state tournament, which will be held from Aug. 1 to 3 in Bloomington.

In last year’s state tournament, New Ulm defeated Chanhassen 8-4 in the first round before being bumped down to the elimination bracket with a 13-0 loss to Fergus Falls. New Ulm went on to pick up another pair of wins in the elimination bracket, taking down Stillwater 15-12 and Chanhassen 3-0, before falling 8-4 to eventual state champion Becker one round before the championship.