April 14, 2008 – COVINGTON
Covington coach Mitch Hirsch was looking for anything to get his Covington Buccaneers on track as his team faced an 8-2 deficit heading into the bottom of the sixth.

That anything was the Buccs' "Number One Fan" Scooby Willoughby, who was fuming outside the fence behind home plate.

Hirsch invited Scooby into the dugout and he gave the Buccaneers a tongue lashing that could be heard throughout the ball park.

"Scooby wasn't a happy camper," chuckled Hirsch. "He sure got the kids going."

The stagnant Buccaneer bats immediately came alive as Covington scored four runs in the bottom of the sixth and two more in the bottom of the seventh to send the game into extra innings with the score 8-8.

"For the first six innings the kids didn't act like they wanted to be here," Hirsch explained. "Once we started hitting the ball, we were fine."

Still, neither team could score in the eighth inning and the game was called due to darkness with the score deadlocked at 8-8.

"I'm pleased with the way we came back after being down by six runs," Hirsch said. "But I'm not very pleased that the kids weren't ready to play when the game started."

The mental mistakes Covington made didn't help starting pitcher Jake Bitner.

Bitner consistently got ahead of the batters, only to see them get away with defensive errors - four of which were committed by Covington for the game.

"He actually pitched pretty well," said Hirsch. "Our defense didn't back him up though. I hated to pull him after the second inning, but we needed a spark."

Kyle Kanet came in and pitched an inning and two-thirds, but three more New Bremen runs pushed the lead to 8-2 in the top of the fourth.

"It wasn't our pitching," Hirsch described. "It was not doing the fundamental things in the field that killed us."

Ben Christian followed Kanet on the mound and pitched the Buccs through two-thirds of the seventh inning.

It was enough to hold New Bremen in check until Covington could get its own bats going in the bottom of the sixth.

"When we decide we are ready to play, we are pretty darn good," Hirsch said. "We've got to be ready to play from the first pitch."

Andy Sparks spelled Christian with two outs in the top of the seventh and finished the contest for the Buccs on the mound.

The Covington pitchers combined to strike out eight and allowed just four walks.

As to whether the game will be concluded, Hirsch isn't sure.

"It all depends on if we both have an opening in our schedule at the same time," he said. "They (New Bremen) begin their conference schedule and I'm sure they are more concerned about that than a non-league game. We also will be getting into the meat of our conference schedule, so we'll be focused on that as well. It all depends on what we can work out as to whether we'll finish this game."

The meat of Covington's conference schedule begins tomorrow as Tri-County North comes to town.

Scoring by Innings:
New Bremen ...........0...5...1...2...0...0...0...0 - 8 .. 11 .. 3
Covington ................0...0...2...0...0...4...2...0 - 8 .. 8 .. 4