ROCKMART – The season came to a close for the Callaway High softball team with a loss to Rockmart on Wednesday in the opening round of the Class AA state tournament.

After winning the first game 11-0, Rockmart finished off the series sweep with a 12-2 win.

In the second game, Skylar Rice had an RBI single to score Kelly Carlisle, and Oeisha Jenkins’ sacrifice fly scored Jasmine Dukes.

It was a 6-2 game in the fifth inning when Callaway center fielder KeKe Talley lost the ball in the sun, and the ball hit her in the face and broke her nose.

Callaway coach Ashley Summerlin said the players had a difficult time maintaining their focus after that, and Rockmart was able to pull away.

In the first game, Summerlin said “we had our opportunities, we just couldn’t get a big hit.”

The future is bright for Callaway, with most of the key players set to return next season.

“We’ve got eight kids coming back next year,” Summerlin said. “We’ll have a lot of juniors and seniors, and we’ll have a good group of sophomores. We’ve got our number one pitcher (Jenkins) and our number two pitcher (Rice) back. We expect to take another step next year.”

Reach Kevin Eckleberry at (706) 884-7311 or on Twitter @lagrangesports