NEW ULM — The Marshall baseball team’s season came to an abrupt end on Saturday with a pair of losses at Mueller Park. The third-seeded Tigers entered the day in the winner’s bracket but fell 8-4 to No. 2 Mankato West in the section quarterfinals before suffering a 9-1 season-ending loss to No. 5 Albert Lea in the Section 2AAA elimination bracket.

Marshall finishes its season at 18-6 and graduates 10 seniors in Samuel Thor, Carter Prins, Cooper Mensink, Liam Kruse, Brody Wixon, Logan Miller, Deagen Maurice, Josh Kraft, Owen Kesteloot and Braxton Koster.

GAME 1

Marshall 4

Mankato West crossed a pair of runs across the plate in the bottom of the first inning of a section quarterfinal matchup against Marshall and never looked back, maintaining its lead for the rest of the game to claim an 8-4 win and advance to the section semifinals.

Eli Alcorn and Logan Miller each pitched three innings for the Tigers and each allowed five hits. Alcorn was charged with the loss after giving up six earned runs in his start, striking out seven batters while walking two, while Miller gave up another pair of earned runs and struck out four batters while walking one.

Marshall got on the board in the top of the first when Thor, Kruse and Chase Alcorn singled consecutively to load the bases with one out. Kraft hit a sacrifice fly to score Thor but a fielder’s choice ended the inning and Kason Neuhring hit a two-run double with two outs in the bottom of the frame to give the Scarlets the lead.

Thor led Marshall with two of the team’s six hits and also drew a pair of walks. Each of Marshall’s hits on the day was a single.

For Mankato West, Benjamin O’Neil racked up a double and two singles while Colten Bahl also had two of the team’s 10 hits. The Scarlets finished with four doubles and a triple as a team.

Mankato West scored on a wild dropped third strike in the second and added three more runs in the fourth to bring their lead up to 6-1. 

Marshall finally got back on the scoreboard when Chase Alcorn and Logan Miller walked and Braxton Koster was hit by a pitch to load the bases with one out in the sixth. A third walk to Maurice forced in a run before a strikeout and a fly out left three runners stranded with the Tigers trailing by four.

A pair of RBI doubles in the bottom of the sixth brought Mankato West’s cushion back to six runs heading into the seventh. Thor, Kruse and Alcorn drew consecutive walks to start the inning and a Kraft single drove in one run. After a pop out put one away, Koster singled in another, but a strikeout and a pop out again left the bases loaded at the end of the game.

GAME 2

Marshall 1

After leaving too many runners in scoring position in its first game of the day, Marshall wasn’t able to generate any offensive momentum in its loss to Albert Lea in the elimination bracket. The Tigers were out-hit 12-4 by Albert Lea and committed four errors while Albert Lea committed none.

A bases-loaded walk gave Albert Lea a run in the top of the first but Marshall answered in the bottom of the frame when Thor singled, stole second and scored on a Chase Alcorn single.

Yet, that was as long as the game remained tied. Albert Lea strung together a triple, three singles, a walk, a hit batter and capitalized on a Marshall error to surge ahead with five runs and never looked back.

Owen Kesteloot was charged with the loss after giving up six earned and two unearned runs on nine hits and two walks over 5 1/3 innings. He struck out eight batters.

In relief, Logan Phillippe gave up one earned run on three hits over 1 2/3 frames.

Chase Alcorn accounted for two of Marshall’s four hits while Thor and Kraft each added another. Wixon also reached base twice on a pair of walks.

Albert Lea added four more insurance runs in the sixth, courtesy of three singles, a hit batter, a dropped third strike and a sacrifice bunt.