The Red Level Tigers made a comeback, but came up short in a 12-9 loss to the Kinston Bulldogs on Friday night in Red Level.

Kinston came out strong and took advantage of a few Tiger miscues in the opening inning to take an early lead.

The Tigers responded with a pair of runs in the bottom of the first, but trailed 7-2 heading into the bottom of the second inning.

Cody Shepard reached first on a walk to start the bottom of the second inning.

After the next batter struck out, Johnnie Coxwell reached off an error that allowed Shepard to come in to score.

Coxwell moved to second when Braxton Lee reached on hard hit ball to shortstop.

The next two batters were retired, and the Tigers trailed 7-3 after two innings of play.

In the top of the third inning, Kinston’s leadoff batter reached after being hit by a pitch.

The runner quickly stole second and then came around to score on an RBI base hit.

After walking the next batter, Lee retired the following batter with a strikeout.

The Tigers then gave up a couple of walks that allowed the Bulldogs to go up 9-3.

In the bottom of the third inning, Christian Spears reached first after an error by the Bulldogs’ third baseman.

Another error off the bat of Chance Russell and a walk to Ethan Edson, loaded up the bases for the Tigers.

Shepard then drew a walk to leave the Tigers trailing 9-4.

A few pitches later, Russell scored off of a wild pitch.

The Tigers then got another hard hit that forced an error from the Bulldogs and allowed Red Level to score.

Red Level continued to swing the bats well as a RBI single from Phillips cut the Kinston lead down to 9-7 heading into the fourth inning.

Kinston responded in the top of the fourth inning with a pair of runs to go up 11-7.

Russell got things started in the bottom of the fourth inning with a scorching one-out single and moved up to second on a throwing error.

Edson then moved Russell to third with a sacrifice, but then the Bulldogs committed an error that allowed Russell to score.

The score remained 11-8 until the bottom of the sixth inning.

Spears reached on a two-out single and then came around to score when Russell launched a ball over the head of the Bulldogs’ center fielder.

Spears scored with ease and Russell came into third with a triple.

However, Kinston added a run the top of the seventh and held on for a 12-9 win.