New Ulm Gold needs little motivation in wins

By JEREMY BEHNKE

Journal Sports Writer

MANKATO -- The New Ulm Gold legion baseball team didn't need a pep talk from any of its players or head coach Dave Kunz on Saturday.

Instead, the motivation came from Mankato Legion's Adam Sorenson, who guaranteed earlier in the tournament that his team will come back and win the American Legion 2nd District championship.

With that quote both in the back of their minds and taped on the dugout wall in two different places, Gold defeated Mankato 14-13 in a wild affair before avenging an earlier loss to New Ulm Blue. Gold defeated Blue 13-4 in the second game and will have to beat Sleepy Eye twice today to advance to the state tournament.

"We got that sheet at the beginning of the week in practice," New Ulm Gold's Josh Thorson said after the first game. "We knew they were going to be a good ball club, and we knew that it was going to be a big run game. We put that up to tell each other we need to play ball, and we came to play."

Thorson and Scott Knisley supplied the lumber -- or metal in this case -- as New Ulm finished with 13 hits. Thorson hit two homeruns -- both over the fence in left -- then proceeded to drive in the game winning RBI in the bottom of the ninth for the win over Mankato, thus eliminating Post 11 from the tournament.

Knisley delivered three hits, two doubles, and six RBIs.

"We know that we had to jump all over their pitchers right away," Thorson said. "We knew that they had a short staff this year. We knew that if we jumped all over them, they'd get rattled, because that's what they tend to do."

Mankato scored three runs in the top of the first, but New Ulm bounced back with three of their own in the bottom of the first then scored twice more in the second.

New Ulm had a 12-7 lead after six innings, but Mankato continued to chip away and eventually tied the game at 13 apiece in the top of the ninth after scoring two more runs off Dusty Farasyn, who got the win in relief of Nick Breu.

But in the bottom of the ninth with one out, Zach Barrett was hit by a pitch and moved ot second on Adam Neubauer's single.

With one out, Thorson swung at a pitch from Sorenson in the dirt for the second strike, then singled to center to end the game.

"I was getting antsy," Thorson said. "I knew that he was coming in with the curve ball, but I didn't pick up the seams."

In the second game against Blue, Gold kept the intensity up and watched Tyler Morgan nearly hit for the cycle. Morgan had two doubles, a single that put him on third after an error, a home run, and five RBIs as Gold ended Blue's season.

"It hasn't been going that good lately," Morgan said. "It just came natural today. I didn't try any harder than I do any other day."

Gold came out and scored the first six runs of the game, all in the second inning, highlighted by a two-run triple by Morgan and a two-run double by Brad Kraus. Morgan said his team wanted to get an early lead against a team that had beaten them a week earlier to drop Gold into the loser's bracket.

"It was really important," Morgan said. "We wanted to take it to them right away."

Josh Sabatino got the win and David Hoffmann took the loss for Blue. Sabatino pitched nine innings, gave up nine hits, four runs, four strike outs, and one walk.

Barrett went 3-for-5 with a double and Bryan Kamm went 2-for-6 with a home run.

Brett Fleck, Kyle Reinarts, Ryan Turbes, and Mitch Blackstad scored runs for Blue, which ended its season at 9-11. Blackstad hit a pinch-hit home run in the seventh.

Gold (16-16) plays Sleepy Eye at 1 p.m. today at Wolverton Field. If Gold wins, the two play again for the right to go to state.