April 4, 2009 - COVINGTON
The mark of a good team is when you can find a ways to win games when you are not playing your best.

For Covington coach Dean Denlinger, he witnessed his team show signs of becoming a good team with a come-from-behind 5-4 victory over Lehman in a game where the Lady Buccs made some critical mistakes.

"Yeah, we had a few errors that we normally don't make," said Denlinger. "But we were able to persevere and overcome our mistakes, which is something we can build on."

Two of Lehman's four runs were unearned, as Covington committed three official errors on the game, but another mistake happened due to a lack of communication that resulted in another run.

"We had a mixup on a fly ball in left field that they scored on," explained Denlinger. "Those (communication) are the types of things we have to correct."

Lehman built a 2-0 lead on a run in the third and another in the fourth, but Covington tied the score in the bottom of the fourth with a pair of runs of its own and then took a 3-2 lead with a run in the fifth.

The Cavs took the lead right back with two more runs in the sixth thanks to two throwing errors and a mishandled fly ball in right field by Covington.

But Covington responded in the bottom half of the sixth to tie the score and Chloe Shell shut down the Lehman offense in the top of the seventh to set up a thrilling finifs.

Kristen Boggs led off the bottom of the seventh with a single to left and Halley Roberts followed with a base hit to put runners at first and second with two outs.

Shell then drilled the first pitch up the gut for the game-winning hit as Boggs scored from second.

"We had a slug, bunt on and Chloe hit the ball into the gap," Denlinger described. "That was probably the best hit all night for us."

Shell finished with two RBI on a 2-4 hitting night to accommodate her two-and-one-third effort in relief on the mound.

Boggs, Sarah Westfall and Halley Roberts all went 2-4 as well, with Westfall recording a triple and an RBI. Haley Smith doubled and Brittany Arnett went 1-3.

Halley Roberts started the contest and pitched four-and-two-third innings, striking out eight and allowing just three hits.

Covington had 10 hits on the afternoon and improves to 3-0 on the season.

The Lady Buccs travel to Bethel on Tuesday to begin Cross County Conference action.

Scoring by Innings:
Lehman ..................0...0...1...1...0...2...0 - 4 - 5 - 1
Covington ...............0...0...0...2...1...1...1 - 5 - 10 - 3