The Lake Mills baseball team would like to have a couple of pitches back from Monday’s 7-2 loss to Osage.

The Green Devils scored five runs on two pitches when they connected on two first-pitch deliveries for a three-run and a two-run homer.

The two-run shot came in the third inning as Osage increased its lead to 4-0 and the Green Devils made it 7-0 after the three-run homer in the fifth inning.

The Bulldogs (11-9 overall, 4-4 NIC) got two runs back in the seventh but missed opportunities earlier in the game.

“We just got behind early and failed to capitalize when we had opportunities,” Lake Mills head coach Jason Blaser said. “We didn’t hit the ball that hard, it seemed like when we did put the ball in play they were weak.”

One of those chances came in the top of the third when the Bulldogs loaded the bases with no outs, but Lake Mills left the bases loaded to crush any hope of getting back in the game.

At that point the Bulldogs allowed two unearned runs to score in the second inning, but after failing to cash in with the bases loaded Osage pushed ahead two in the bottom of the third to grab a firm lead.

Chris Throne started for Lake Mills and went five full innings, allowing seven runs on 10 hits and striking out three in the loss.

The Bulldogs expected a better outing after defeating the Green Devils May 30 1-0 at home in the first half of the conference season.

“Hopefully we can come back from it,” Blaser said. “It would have been nice to start the conference 1-0 again.”

Lake Mills plays host to West Hancock Wednesday in a doubleheader.

Osage 7, Lake Mills 2

Lake Mills – 000 000 2 – 2 4 2

Osage – 022 030 x – 7 10 1

LP – Chris Throne 5 IP, 10 H, 7 R, 5 ER, 3 K, 1 BB