COLUMBIA — After having its district game at Bowling Green rained out Tuesday, the Centreville Lady Tigers returned to action Thursday afternoon at Columbia Academy.

And the five-day layoff due to the rain event showed as the Lady Tigers had just three hits in a 9-3 loss to the Lady Cougars.

Centreville, which dropped to 7-6 on the season, didn’t score its first run until the top of the third inning, and by the time that inning was over it had trailed 5-1.

“We came out flat, but they hit the ball and played good defense,” head coach Mark Mann said. “I don’t know mentally, emotionally we came out flat. The five-day layoff may have had something to do with that, but it shouldn’t have.”

Columbia’s starting pitcher went the distance, striking out three and walking three. The defense behind her did its job as well, committing no errors.

Columbia Academy scored three runs in the bottom of the second and added two more in the bottom of the third.

After Centreville scored one run in the top of the fourth inning, the Lady Cougars put the game away by scoring four runs in the bottom of the fifth. The Lady Tigers scored their final run in the top of the sixth.

Mann said the Lady Tigers had been playing well, but bad games will pop up.

“You’re going to have a game like that every now and then,” Mann said. “As young as we are this year, you run into that.”

Tori Rouse was the losing pitcher for Centreville. She went four-plus innings, giving up six runs on nine hits and three walks while striking out just one batter.

The Lady Cougars’ bats were on fire, as Columbia Academy racked up 13 hits in the game.

Centreville will play at the Silliman Tournament in Clinton, La. on Saturday. The Lady Tigers will take on Amite School Center at 8 a.m., ACCS at 11 a.m., and host Silliman at 12:30 p.m.

Franklin Academy 10,

Huntington 0

WINNSBORO, La. — Katy Little and Emily Collins combined on a no-hit, nine-strikeout performance to lead the Lady Cougars past the Lady Hounds Thursday night in District 6-A action.

Franklin Academy scored two runs in the bottom of the fourth inning for a 10-0 lead and then Little held the Lady Hounds scoreless in the top of the fifth to end the game by way of the 10-run rule.

Little pitched the first, fourth and fifth innings and she struck out six batters. Collins, who also went 3-for-3 at the plate, pitched the second and third innings and struck out three.

“At this point, what I’m looking for is improvement and I saw some tonight,” Huntington assistant coach Rut Horne said. “Shortstop Emily Johns had a lot of fielding opportunities and she made the most of them.

“We started a seventh-grader in the outfield. Eighth-grader Brianna Stockstill played third base. The infield was very solid. The only thing we’ve got to work on is at catcher. Eleventh-grader Abi Brown is in her first year playing softball.”

But perhaps the even bigger story for Huntington’s return to fast-pitch softball after a one-year hiatus is that for the third time in about a week, the Lady Hounds have a new head coach. First, Marian Newman was replaced by then-assistant coach David Boydstun.

Then, surprisingly, Boydstun resigned from not only being the softball coach, but as boys’ and girls’ softball coach and athletic director at Huntington on Wednesday and Penny Moak was named the new softball coach and Horne is now the assistant coach.

“We played pretty good ball. By and large the balls that were hit were caught,” Horne said.

Julie Moak pitched all four innings for Huntington (0-4, 0-2) and she struck out two and walked four. The Lady Hounds will travel to Bastrop, La. to play in the Prairie View Academy Tournament on Saturday with its first game scheduled for 9 a.m.