Lawrence High baseball coach Brad Stoll has told his players all season that the difference between the games they win and lose is just one or two plays.

The common theme was easy to see on Thursday when the Lions lost, 7-4, against Blue Valley Northwest in the River City Baseball Festival at Kansas University’s Hoglund Ballpark.

The Lions led, 4-3, after the fourth inning when senior Nolan Prochaska hit a leadoff single, moved up on a single from senior Nyle Anderson and scored on a sacrifice fly from junior catcher Ivan Hollins.

But BV Northwest responded with three runs in the fifth inning. A throwing error on a pickoff helped the Huskies turn a leadoff single into a run on a single by the next batter, junior Nick Mehlin. After a walk and a hit batsman — one of the seven free passes issued by LHS pitchers — junior Cole Duensing made the Lions pay with a two-run double.

The Huskies also scored three runs in the third inning, taking advantage of an error on a potential double-play grounder and drawing three walks in the frame.

“Our margin for error is not such where we can mess up a double play ball,” Stoll said. “Our margin for error is not such where we can walk six and hit one. We can’t do that and we’re getting exposed for it. The beautiful thing is in 24 hours we’ll be taking (batting practice) getting ready to play our next game.”

Hollins added: “When you’re always in a close game like that, that one error just brings you down. But then you’ve just got to look for that ‘next play’ mentality.”

The Lions (2-9) received a big boost from the bottom of their lineup. Their eighth hitter in the lineup, Anderson, and nine hitter, Hollins, combined for three of the team’s six hits, a run and a RBI.

“If Ivan and I get on with no outs and the top of the lineup comes around, that’s runs automatically,” said Anderson, who went 2-for-3. “The top of our lineup is phenomenal. So we just do what we can do to get on base so they can score us.”

However, the Lions didn’t get the boost they were hoping for from the top of the lineup. Senior shortstop Michael Sinks hit a leadoff single in the second inning and eventually scored on a wild pitch.

Hollins and junior center fielder Daonte Lowery led off the third inning with back-to-back singles, scoring on a sacrifice fly from junior Brad Kincaid and a RBI groundout by Sinks.

But, the top five LHS hitters combined to go 2-for-13.

“We just didn’t get a whole lot of production from guys that we’re counting on, and that’s the bottom line,” Stoll said. “We got production from the bottom of the lineup.”

In the final three innings, the Lions had only one hit against BV Northwest reliever Josh Fiene.

LHS will face Jefferson City (Missouri) at 8:15 p.m. today at LHS.

BV NW 003 031 0 — 7 11 0

Lawrence 012 100 0 — 4 6 4

W — Josh Fiene. L — Brad Kincaid.

2B — Nathaniel Vossman, Cole Duensing, Nick Mehlin, BVNW.

LHS highlights — Daonte Lowery, 4 IP, 6 H, 1 ER, 2-for-4, 3 runs; Kincaid, 1-for-4, 2 RBIs; Sinks, 3-for-4, 3 RBIs, 2 runs; McAlister, 1-for-4, 2 RBI.