It was the little things that cost Minnesota two of three games against Michigan State last weekend.

A play here, a pitch there, an out there.

It doesn’t help when multiple starting position players are out of the lineup with injuries, which has been the case all season for the Gophers.

Minnesota head coach John Anderson has been shuffling lineups for the last several weeks, and he has had to work around injuries to right fielder Trip Schultz, center fielder Troy Larson and shortstop Michael Handel.

“We don’t have a lot of moves we can make. We’ve kind of got to go with what we have,” Anderson said. “We just don’t have enough offense right now.”

Third baseman Kyle Geason returned to the lineup two weeks ago after missing six weeks with a wrist injury. He went 4-for-12 in three games against MSU.

“He’s helped us. There’s no question about that,” Anderson said of Geason. “But he hadn’t played in several weeks. He’s still feeling his way around.”

The shuffle will continue as players recover, but Anderson said he still hopes the team can be healthy by the end of the season.

“We’d like to have the team I wanted to put out there all year maybe for five or 10 games in a row,” he said.

For now, the undermanned Gophers will travel to Fargo, N.D., for a Wednesday game at North Dakota State.

NDSU swept Minnesota in a midweek series March 20-21 at the Metrodome.

The Gophers are 14-6 since then. Minnesota will resume Big Ten play this weekend against Iowa.