“We put the ball in play,” Cathedral head coach Jamie Kuehn said. “We left some runners in scoring position, but that’s going to happen and ultimately we came away with the win. But I’m happy we put the ball into play and made the other team work for their outs.”

The Greyhounds defense was particularly impressive during the game, as of the 21 outs, 18 of them were in the field or on the bases and the team committed no errors.

“We know Abbey [Hillesheim] and Jayde [Altermatt] are going to give up some hits, so we know we have to play solid D behind them in order to support them,” Kuehn said. “We’re just seeing the ball really well on the defensive side and making the plays that we have to make.”

Nicollet, for its part, was making good contact at times, but fly balls and grounders seemed to go right to defenders all game.

Staff photo by Ari Selvey Nicollet’s Lydia Martens makes a throw over to second from shortstop during a Tomahawk-Valley Conference crossover softball game against New Ulm Cathedral Tuesday at Nicollet High School.

“I think we just need more consistent gameplay,” Nicollet head coach Marc Bode said. “Just to see more live pitched like that. We missed some balls, got under them. Hit them right at them, but that’s the nature of the beast sometimes. Sometimes they’ll fall, and sometimes we’ll hit them at them.”

Still, coach Bode was happy with his team’s approach at the plate and how they played against the defending state champions.

“I think they did pretty well,” he said. “We held them to six runs. We have not played too many games this year. We’ve been crushed by the weather, so we’ve only been playing one game a week. But they battled, played a really tough game and kept them off balance, but defensively, we gave them some. You can’t do that against a team like that, they’re going to capitalize on that every time. They played flawless defense and didn’t give us any of those second opportunities, and that was the difference in the game.”

Abbey Hillesheim earned the win for Cathedral, striking out three and allowing two runs on six hits in a complete game. At the plate, Ava Schmid was 2 for 5 with a triple an two RBIs, while Altermatt had two singles. Ashlynn Hillesheim was 1 for 3 with a double and two runs scored, while Jaylin Harntess had a hit, an RBI and two runs scored. Margo Finstad and Madelyn Haala each had a hit and an RBI in the game.

Leah Bode took the loss for Nicollet, striking out six while allowing three earned runs on nine hits. At the plate, Zoie Rengstorf was 2 for 2 with a run scored, while Cason Forbrook was 2 for 3 with two RBIs. Chloe Kachelmeier had a hit and an run scored.

Cathedral opened the scoring in the first inning with Ashlynn Hillesheim doubling, then being brought home on a triple from Schmid. Schmid then scored on a sacrifice fly from Hartness to make it a 2-0 game.

Both teams were scoreless in the second, with the Cathedral defense executing a 1-2-3 inning, but Cathedral got back on the board in he third as Hartness reached on an error, stole second, then came home on a single from Haala. Cathedral scored twice more as the offense stayed consistent in the fourth, capitalizing on two errors from Nicollet to score Ava Brennan and Ashlynn Hilleshiem, with Schmid picking up an RBI.

The fifth was another scoreless inning, and Cathedral scored one in the sixth as a single by Finstad sent Harntess home. Nicollet was finally able to string some hits together in the seventh inning, with Kachelmeier and Rengstorf getting back-to-back singles and Leah Bode drawing a walk before Forbrook single to score Kachelmeier and Rengstorf to cut the lead to 6-2. However, the Cathedral defense stiffened back up as Hartness caught a pop up from her catcher position and a flyout ended the game.

Cathedral (6-2) travels to Sleepy Eye St. Mary’s for a doubleheader on Wednesday, while Nicollet (3-3) travels to Cleveland on Thursday.