May 15, 2008 – COVINGTON
After two straight seasons of dropping their first tournament game, the Covington Buccaneers were looking to get a win any way they could get it Thursday against Riverside.

After seven innings of play the Buccs did just that by holding off a late Riverside surge to take a 7-4 win.

"It wasn't our best game, but we'll take this one," said a delighted Covington coach Mitch Hirsch. "Any time you can get a win in the tournament it's a good win."

After a scoreless first inning the Buccs got rolling in the second with three runs.

David Moss led off with a single and Nate Lavey walked to put runners at first and second.

Andy Sparks drilled an RBI single to score Moss and Brent Shively singled to score Sparks and Lavey to give Covington a 3-0 lead.

After Riverside scored a run in the top of the third, Covington responded with two more runs.

Adam Craft and Lavey drew one-out walks and Sparks followed with an RBI as he drove in Craft on a ground out.

Lavey moved to third on the play and then stole home for the second Covington run of the inning.

"They (Riverside) changed pitchers and when I saw he didn't even look over at third on the first pitch I told Nate to go on the second one," Hirsch explained of the strategy. "The kid didn't look and Nate actually beat the pitch to the plate."

The Buccs extended their lead to 7-1 in the bottom of the fifth as Lavey walked and Sparks reached on an error.

Both runners moved and extra base on the overthrow from the shortstop to set up an RBI ground-out by Shively.

Jake Bitner then drove in Sparks with a single to give Covington more cushion on the scoreboard.

"We were ready to play tonight and it showed in the first four or five innings," Hirsch said. "The kids know that the tournament is different than the regular season because everyone picks it up a notch."

But Covington gave Riverside some hope in the six and seventh innings by giving up three runs.

Two of those runs came in the seventh after Covington was one pitch away from ending the contest.

"We need to finish better," Hirsch said. "We sort of lost our focus there late in the game and they took advantage. But we were able to get the win and that's all that matters right now."

Darrell Thobe went the distance on the mound for Covington and struck out ten batters while only allowing one walk.

Brent Shively drove in three runs and Andy Sparks drove in two runs, while Kyle Kanet connected on a triple.

The Buccaneers are back in action on Saturday at Tipp City against a familiar foe in Lehman.

Game time is scheduled for 1:00 pm.

Scoring by Innings:
Riverside .........0...0...1...0...0...1...2 - 4 .. 4 .. 4
Covington ........0...3...2...0...2...0...x - 7 .. 5 .. 3