George Rogers Clark fell 11-6 to district opponent Bourbon County Tuesday night to give the Cardinals their first district and region loss of the season.

Clark County held a 6-2 lead for a majority of the game until the fifth inning.

Bourbon was able to make a comeback thanks to a three-run homer to bring the Colonels to within one run. Bourbon went on to score five runs in the inning and finished with two home runs as a team for the day.

Christina Young started the game off for the Cards as she hit a pop up to second base and was able to get to first due to an error from the Bourbon second baseman.

Claire Brandenburg followed Young in the lineup and smacked a double sending Young home for the first run of the game.

Clark had no errors in the field, but could not find a way to match Bourbon’s strong bats.

GRC finished with nine hits while Bourbon collected 16.

The big inning for the Cards was the third inning when they managed to score four runs. Courtney Miles, Kendall Harrison, Marly Rogers and Aly Kidd all drove in runs in the inning.

Despite the district loss, head coach Daniel Rogers was pleased with his team’s performance.

“We started off pretty well,” he said. “We were hitting the ball well and had good defense. The pitching looked good. Then when they hit that three run homer in the fifth inning and then they just started hitting. We played good defense all the way around but Bourbon hit the ball and they’re a good hitting team. We just got out hit tonight and have to move forward to next game.”

Rogers said that he has seen his team and grow and develop in each game they have played.

“At this point from what we looked like compared to the beginning of the season where we were making eight or nine errors a game to none or only one error,” he said. “We’re hitting the ball a whole lot better and our pitching has gotten better so we’ve came a long way. We’ve only got seven wins, but that doesn’t reflect how we’ve played. We’ve lost several tight games and we’ve also gotten blown out. We’re also really young. We’ve got six or seven eighth graders on the team with three or four in the lineup. We’re young, but the way we’ve played I think they have held their own. I’m not concerned. We don’t want to lose any games but today is something we can learn from and be ready to play next time.

Rogers said to not count his team out yet as the second half of the season is when each team plays their best ball.

“Our improvement on defense has gotten so much better since the start of the year,” he said. “They’re really getting after it out there. We’ve hit the ball really well, but I’ve been really impressed with the way they have progressed throughout the year. We’ve only got seven wins but we’ve really came a long way. Halfway through now, but we still have 15 games to go.”

Clark will head to Berea on Thursday and will not return to Cardinal Heights until May 7 when they face Rowan County at 6 p.m.