AKRON – The Covington Lady Buccs put together a great season, but came up short in the state semi-final in a 9-2 loss to Portsmouth Notre Dame (27-3).

The defeat ends Covington’s season at 21-10 with the fifth state final four in the history of the program.

What hurt the Lady Buccs were the three errors that were displayed on the scoreboard, but three additional plays that could have been made that would have prevented Notre Dame from putting critical runs across the plate.

Still, the Lady Buccs played hard and kept battling throughout the game even though there were only five hits accumulated. Many powerful shots were hit by Covington, but the Lady Titans made many great defensive plays.

The Titans scored a run in the second inning after a Covington error and two more runs in the third after another error by the Lady Buccs would have ended the inning without a run scored.

The Lady Buccs closed the gap to 3-2 by scoring two runs in the bottom of the third. Ava Hartwig drilled a triple that drove in Taylor Foutz for the first run and then Elizabeth Coblentz connected on a well executed bunt that scored Hartwig. Unfortunately, the Lady Buccs left runners stranded on the bases that prevented more runs.

Portsmouth Notre Dame captured a huge inning in the top of the fourth with the big hit being a three-run home run. The Titans then pushed their lead to 7-2 with another run in the top of the fifth.

Covington had additional scoring opportunities due to great base running by Emalyn Johnson after drawing walks and smashing a hit, but those opportunities never were capitalized on.

Portsmouth Notre Dame then close out the game by scoring two more runs in the top of the seventh and holding the Lady Buccs scoreless after the third inning.

The loss was emotional for the Lady Buccs, but it didn’t diminish how great the entire season was due to their overall effort, team unity and outstanding performances. This team reached the state final four and set a new school record with 48 home runs – 21 more than the previous record.

Congratulations to the Lady Buccs and a huge amount of credit for the success goes to the only senior on the team, Elizabeth Coblentz. She had a huge impact on the program due to her passion for the game of softball and also set a standard in Covington for how much she gave to so many others in other sports and within the school system.

Also, a huge amount of credit for this great season was the outstanding coaching staff – Brooke Gostomsky-Menker, Erin Morgan and Michayla Oates.