The Albert Lea baseball dropped its ninth consecutive game 8-5 Tuesday against Mankato East.

The Tigers got behind 4-0 early, but rallied in the fourth inning for three runs and scored two more in the top of the sixth to tie the game.

The Cougars scored the go-ahead run in the bottom half of the inning on a suicide squeeze and added two more runs in the inning for the win.

Albert Lea showed signs of its offense finally breaking out of funk with seven hits in the game.

&8220;We did a little better job of hitting,&8221; head coach Joe Sczublewski said.

Senior Anthony Tippett allowed seven runs on 13 hits and struck out five in the loss, but the Tigers&8217; offense left seven runners on the bases in the game.

&8220;This was a game we would have liked to win,&8221; Sczublewski said. &8220;We need to win a game pretty soon. We&8217;ve been struggling.&8221;