APRIL 19, 2010 - COVINGTON
Covington's Brandon Powell threw as well as any coach could possibly expect for seven innings of a baseball game Monday night, but unfortunately the sophomore wasn't rewarded with a win.

"Brandon threw a whale of a game," said Covington coach Mitch Hirsch after his team let a golden opportunity at a win slip away in a 6-3 loss to New Bremen. "They (New Bremen) didn't hit him hard at all. We just didn't help him out in the field."

Powell struck out seven batters and allowed just one walk in going the full seven inning for the Buccs.

But three errors and poor angles in the outfield cost Covington in a game that was there for the taking.

"In the sixth we had two outs and we let a ball get by us in the outfield that led to a triple instead of a single," Hirsch explained. "The next thing you know they put three runs on the board in that inning. That cost us."

Taking good angles to the ball is something Hirsch has been stressing to his kids all along.

"We've been talking about taking good angles to the ball," Hirsch continued. "We've been practicing it. In a tight game like this you can't give the other team extra bases by taking a poor angle to a baseball hit in the outfield. That cost us tonight."

The first three innings were scoreless, although Covington had its chances to break the game open early as it had bases loaded in both the first and second innings. Both times the Buccs came away without crossing the plate and ended up leaving 11 runners stranded in the contest.

"At times we hit the ball hard and at other times we were way out on our front foot," said Hirsch. "It cost us when we had runners in scoring position because we never could get that big hit to keep a rally going."

The rally killer in the second inning came as a result of a double play when an fly ball was mishandled in the infield by New Bremen. The play resulted in a double play, however.

"We had the bases loaded with no outs and we popped a ball up in the infield," Hirsch described. "All of our runners stayed and when he (the New Bremen fielder) dropped the ball they threw us out at home and third. We thought it was should have been ruled an infield fly."

Still, Covington squandered two golden opportunities to give Powell some cushion on the scoreboard early and it cost the Buccs in the fourth and fifth innings as New Bremen scored a run in both innings to take a 2-0 lead.

That followed with a three-run sixth inning by New Bremen to push the deficit to 5-0 in favor of the visitors.

Covington finally broke through in the fifth with a two-run triple by Andrew DeHart, but the inning should have resulted in more runs as a Buccaneer runner was thrown out at second base.

New Bremen capped its effort with a run in the seventh and then held Covington to a run in the bottom of the seventh to preserve a 6-3 victory.

"For some reason we didn't have any fire tonight," Hirsch stated. "Brandon threw well enough to get us a win tonight."

The two big sticks for Covington came from the bats of Andrew DeHart and Adam Craft. Dehart tripled and drove in 2 runs, while Craft drove in another run on a double.

But it wasn't enough to help out Brandon Powell, who deserved to get the win on the mound.

SCORING BY INNINGS:
New Bremen .........0...0...0...1...1...3...1 - 6 .. 7 .. 2
Covington ..............0...0...0...0...0...2...1 - 3 .. 5 .. 3

Covington's Record: 3-10