LUCASVILLE — The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Southern baseball has had a lot of turnover in personnel over the last three springs because of graduation, but the Tornadoes keep finding a way to make it to the regional tournament.

That was the case again Saturday afternoon at Valley High School, as third-seeded Southern captured its third consecutive Division IV district championship trophy after defeating fourth-seeded Whiteoak by a 13-8 decision in Scioto County.

The Tornadoes (13-12) never trailed in the contest, establishing a 9-0 advantage after just one inning of play. The Wildcats — who were the home team on the scoreboard — rallied to score seven times in their next three at-bats to pull within 9-7 after four complete.

The Purple and Gold provided themselves some breathing room with a four-run explosion in the top of the fifth for a 13-7 cushion after five full frames. WHS added one final score in the bottom of the seventh to pull within 13-8, but never came closer the rest of the way.

Southern advances to the regional semifinals on Thursday at Beavers Field in Lancaster, where it will take on Newark Catholic at 2 p.m. SHS has faced Newark Catholic in each of the previous two regional semifinal appearances, losing 8-6 and 12-2 in those contests.

Symmes Valley and Toronto make up the other half of the regional bracket in Lancaster, with those clubs being slated to play on Thursday at 5 p.m. The two semifinal winners will play Friday at 2 p.m. in the regional championship game.

Sitting just one game over .500 after this triumph, SHS coach Ryan Lemley admits that it has been an interesting journey in getting back to the regional tournament. But as Lemley also confessed, no Southern team under his guidance has ever worked better together than this one — which may be a large reason why the ’Does are headed back to Lancaster.

“We set out to do this from the beginning of the year, but this is a special thing that these guys have done here today. We had some bad losses early on that took us out of the league hunt, but this team never folded and continued to stick with it — and here we are,” Lemley commented. “They had to buy into the team concept a little bit more this year because we couldn’t just roll over anyone. We don’t have one particular star on this team, but one through nine on this lineup is pretty talented. They had to work together to get this.”

Nothing exemplified that collectiveness more than Southern’s opening at-bat, which resulted in the guests sending 13 batters to the plate. The end result was nine runs on seven hits, three errors and a walk, allowing the Tornadoes to jump out to a 9-0 cushion after one complete.

Brad Brown had two hits in the inning, while J.D. Whittington, Jordan Taylor, Chris Holter, Dustin Salser and Michael Manuel all provided one safety. Whittington and Brown each scored twice, while Manuel, Taylor, Holter, Zach Ash and Greg Jenkins also scored once.

The Wildcats countered with a run in their half of the second, as a leadoff double by Ethan Eyre turned into their first score when Steven Robinson hit a sacrifice fly to center — plating Eyre for a 9-1 contest after two complete.

The hosts continued to whittle away at their deficit, plating two more scores in the third and four more runs in the fourth, turning that eight-run disadvantage into a two-run margin after four full frames.

But in the top of the fifth, Southern seized control of the game with a four-run rally to take a 13-7 cushion. Taylor Deem led off the inning by reaching on an error, then Whittington singled to give the guests two on with nobody out.

Brown followed by reaching safely after being hit by a pitch, then Manuel singled in Deem, Whittington and Brown for a 12-7 edge. Zach Ash singled home Manuel two batters later, making it a comfortable 13-7 advantage.

Robinson was issued a leadoff walk in the bottom of the seventh, then later scored on a single by Jerry Stuckey to complete the contest at its 13-8 final.

The Tornadoes had 14 hits in the contest, including at least one safety from eight different players. Manuel led the way with three hits, followed by Whittington, Brown, Taylor and Holter with two apiece. Ash, Jenkins and Dustin Salser also had one safety each in the triumph. Manuel led the offense with three RBIs.

Whiteoak — which had 12 hits in the setback — was led by Eyre, Stuckey, Ben Barnett, Marshall Banks and Zach Bingamon with two hits each. WHS committed four errors in the contest, one more than Southern’s three miscues.

Kyle Cunningham was the winning pitcher of record, allowing eight hits and seven runs over 3.2 innings of work while striking out one. Manuel finished the game in relief, allowing five hits over 3.1 innings of work while fanning two. Matt Valandingham took the loss for Whiteoak, lasting only two-thirds of an inning.

Lemley is proud of the way his team has stepped up to the challenge over the last two weeks, particularly this week at the district level. And despite the losses over the years, this group has truly proven that success breeds success.

“The key for us in both of these district wins was getting out to an early lead and being able to finish things down the stretch. Whiteoak is a talented and very well-coached club — and they battled back to their credit — but our experience kicked in and we put some insurance runs on the board,” Lemley said. “We have lost a dozen seniors over the previous two seasons, but these five seniors this year have also been a big part of those two regional qualifiers. We have some people that have been here before, which has really helped these younger guys in this postseason.”

Southern 13, Whiteoak 8

Southern 900 040 0 — 13 14 3

Whiteoak 012 400 1 — 8 12 4

WP — Cunningham; LP — Valandingham.