MARYSVILLE — The Escanaba Minor All-Star softball team (age 9-10) fell to Edwardsburg 15-5 in five innings in its first game of pool play in the state tournament here Friday.

The score may not indicate it, but hits were far and few between for both teams. Esky finished with three and Edwardsburg with five.

Escanaba manager Justin Jacobsen put the difference down to two things.

“I think the nerves kind of hit the girls early,” he said.

“Our pitching really struggled today. It was also hot. I think that once we got down it was difficult to recover.”

Edwardsburg scored many of its runs on walks, hit batters and stolen bases.

“We couldn’t find the strike zone, so we had a lot of walks,” Jacobsen said. “(Edwardsburg) was aggressive and stole bases when they could. The second time around seeing this pitcher we were able to get some hits. We were swinging the bats and not making good contact, if any.

“These mistakes are easily fixable. We just need to keep our head in it, and tomorrow’s a new day.”

Escanaba’s runs came on a double to right field by Janessa Platt, a single by Mary Kate Tourangeau and Chloe Dubord, and Claire Jacobsen scoring on a wild pitch.

Landry Bray took the loss for Escanaba over 1 1/3 innings, and Breeleigh Reinhart pitched the remainder in relief.

Escanaba faces Midland Bullock Creek at noon today and Hudsonville at 4:30 Sunday.

“I told the girls that today’s game is done with, and we need to move on to tomorrow’s game,” manager Jacobsen said. “Hopefully, we come out and score runs right away and score runs faster than we did today. Our goal is to win tomorrow and Sunday and move on to Monday.”