NSA drops two to finish regular season

Published 9:55 pm Monday, May 6, 2019

The Nansemond-Suffolk Academy softball team dropped its last two regular season games before heading into the postseason.

NSA matched up with two tough opponents to finish out the week last weekend when they took on Hickory and Brunswick Academy. In their matchup against Hickory, the Lady Saints lost by a single run, 6-5. A double from Hickory in the seventh inning scored a run and sealed its win.

Last Saturday, the Lady Saints matched up with Brunswick and lost 1-0. It was a tight game between the two as they went into the seventh inning in a scoreless tie before Brunswick scored to take the win.

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NSA will shift its focus to the postseason, as the conference tournament starts Tuesday. Despite a few close losses in the last two weeks of the regular season, coach Brittany Thornburg feels confident in what the Lady Saints are capable of accomplishing.

“We’ve had some conversations about playing our game,” she said. “We have a competitive team, and if we can put our offense and defense together, we can go as far as we want to in this postseason.”

All six of NSA’s losses have come by three runs or less. To avoid those close losses Thornburg believes they can get off to faster starts instead of sometimes putting things together in later innings. The Lady Saints will be in some close games in the stet tournament, and Thornburg knows getting off to a faster start will serve them well against tougher teams.

“In most of the losses we did one thing well and didn’t do the other as well,” she said. “Some games we’ll have a strong defense but won’t put the ball in play and vice-versa. Hopefully, we put it all together in the next couple of weeks.”

At 16-6, NSA still feels good about where it is going into the postseason. The Lady Saints will host Bishop Sullivan Catholic at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday in the first round of the conference tournament.