NEDERLAND — The biggest inning was going to win the ballgame.

The Nederland Bulldogs tried to respond to the Lumberton Raiders’ big inning with timely hitting, but came up short Tuesday at home as Lumberton held on for a 7-5 win.

“These kids played really well,” Lumberton coach Alex Davis said. “It could have gone either way a lot of different times in this game.”

Lumberton (8-6, 4-2 in District 22-5A) scored four runs on five hits and took advantage of two of Nederland’s four errors in the fourth inning to overcome a 2-0 deficit in the fourth.

“We got a little sloppy defensively and threw the ball around a little bit,” Bulldogs coach Bryan Spell said. “They capitalized on our mistakes. The deficit was a little too much to overcome in the end.”

Before the outburst, starters Jason Parker of Lumberton and Braydon Credeur of Nederland battled right out of the gate. Credeur gave up four straight hits in the onslaught, but had struck out one and allowed another hit in the first three.

Parker, who earned the win, scattered four runs (two earned) on seven hits over five innings, striking out three straight Bulldog batters looking in the second. Nederland (8-9, 4-3) also left 11 on base, seven in scoring position.

Brendan Dunkleberger calmed things down in the Lumberton fourth by fanning three of the next four batters, but the Raiders expanded the lead to 6-2 in the top of the fifth.

The Bulldogs answered with two runs of their own in the bottom half, one on a Burke Badon single and another forced in by a Dane Jones walk. That rally, however, was snapped when it was ruled a runner from third took off too early on a flyout to left field with bases full, resulting in a third out.

Nederland fired up another rally by juicing the bases again in the seventh, but only managed to produce a run on a passed ball. Still, the Bulldogs finished with 10 hits to the Raiders’ nine, as Chase Kemp led the way going 3 for 4.

“That was a point of emphasis coming into today, swinging the bat better, and we definitely did that today,” Spell said.

Austin Krautz and Badon each had two hits for Nederland. Stephen Yarbro, Ryan Smith and Michael Mott each lined two hits to lead Lumberton.

Nederland visits Vidor on Friday to start a new round of district games.

“Every game’s important and we’re going to take them one at a time and focus on winning that ballgame,” Spell said.