Emmaus Legion head coach Ryan Schaffer has been pleased with his team’s pitching in each of the past two games. The Hornet pitchers have done their jobs on the mound and been worthy of picking up wins.

But inconsistent defense has caused Emmaus to lose each of its past two games. And Saturday morning’s meeting with Lower Macungie was no different.

The Hornets (2-4) committed six errors that helped Lower Mac hold on for a 5-4 victory at Limeport Stadium over the weekend in a four-game legion rivalry day event.

“We’re down on pitchers a little bit,” Schaffer said. “But really for the last two games, even though we didn’t get two wins, our pitchers did their job. It was more or less the defense and the mental errors behind our pitchers.

“Those plays should be made no matter what. But it is what it is. You have to overcome those errors. We tried at the end there, but just didn’t have enough.”

Despite the errors, Emmaus had its chance late to make up for them. A 5-2 deficit heading into the bottom of the seventh inning couldn’t stop the Hornets from putting together one last comeback effort.

After Collin Schaffer was hit by a pitch to start the seventh, Matt Madigan lined a single just inside the third base line that moved Schaffer over to third base. After a fielder’s choice in the next at-bat, Zane Cook walked to load the bases for the Hornets with just one out.

Steven Doddy then came up with the Hornets’ biggest hit of the game, a bloop single to right field that brought home two runs to get Emmaus within 5-4. But with runners on the corners and one out, a hard-hit ball from David Cobb was right at a Lower Mac infielder, who was able to turn a game-ending double play at first base.

“It was a nice line drive shot and we likely tie the game,” Schaffer said. “But it’s the game of baseball. What are you going to do?”

Emmaus trailed the entire game but never gave in. Cook singled in the bottom of the third inning to score Madigan and erase a 1-0 lead for Lower Mac.

But that’s when the errors started to mount. After Doddy recorded two straight outs for Emmaus to open the fifth, back-to-back infield errors put runners on the corners for Lower Mac moments later. Vincent Petrizzi kept the inning alive with a RBI-single in the next at-bat, and an error in the outfield after overrunning the ball brought home another run in the inning.

Another Hornet error in the fifth inning aided in two Lower Mac runs as the Mustangs took a 5-1 lead.

“Obviously on top of it, when you give up some runs on errors and you have a chance to get them back, I think it’s even more debilitating when you don’t score those runs when you get runners on,” Schaffer said. “We tried to mentally keep them up because of that…We tell them to have a short memory, move on and just play the game.”

Emmaus had runners on first and second base in the second inning with no outs but failed to bring home a run. Again in the sixth, the Hornets had a prime opportunity with two runners on base and left them stranded.