Bowling Green catcher Kamren James (center) attempts to make a play at the plate during Sunday’s game against Greenville at Bowling Green Park.

The champagne celebration was put on hold for the Bowling Green Hot Rods, who dropped the regular season home finale 6-1 to the Greenville Drive on Sunday at Bowling Green Ballpark.

With a chance to clinch the South Atlantic League Southern Division second-half title – and a playoff spot – Bowling Green (74-49 overall, 38-19 second half) couldn’t find the offense, allowing Greenville to avoid a six-game sweep and stay alive in the postseason chase.

Despite the loss the Hot Rods are in firm control, taking five of six from Greenville to move 6½ games up with six to play.

“We came into this week a game and a half up,” BG manager Rafael Valenzuela said. “We played really well the first five days. Put ourselves in a good spot to go into the postseason and hopefully make a deep run and deliver a championship to Bowling Green.”

Bowling Green was able to take advantage of the Greenville bullpen in the previous five games – using late rallies to take control and stack wins. Valenzuela said he was proud of his team’s focus during the series.

“We came in with the mentality that this was going to be a big week,” Valenzuela said. “Like I told the guys earlier, whoever slows the game down and is able to execute when it matters is going to win the game. I thought we did a very good job. Today didn’t go our way, but we are looking forward to bouncing back on Tuesday and seeing what happens.”

While BG took advantage of late rallies for most of the series, Greenville (60-66, 34-26) was the team that pulled away late in Sunday’s finale.

Bowling Green took advantage of a walk and two errors to score its only run of the day in bottom of the second. The Hot Rods missed a chance to add to the lead when Kamren James was thrown out at home on the back end of a double steal to end the inning.

Greenville surged in front in the fourth, loading the bases to start the inning after singles from Will Turner and Bryan Gonzalez and a walk to Zach Erhard. A passed ball allowed Turner to score the tying run and Gonzalez gave the Drive a 2-1 lead after scoring on a sacrifice fly. Luis Ravelo added an RBI single to cap the three-run rally.

It remained 3-1 to the eighth before the Drive was able to put the game away.

Greenville added three insurance runs, including a two-run single from Gonzalez.

“We have to tip our cap when they pitch well, but we didn’t play our best baseball today,” Valenzuela said. “Offensively, we didn’t have it. Defensively, we made a couple of miscues that went into it being big innings and on the base paths I thought we could have done a little better. It was one of those days. It’s really tough to sweep. It’s tough to win series, but it’s tougher to sweep.”

Bowling Green finished with five hits, two from Hunter Haas. The Hot Rods stranded nine runners, going 1-for-12 with runners in scoring position.

Brody Hopkins took the loss dropping to 1-3, allowing three runs – two earned – in 4⅓ innings.

Bowling Green now heads to Greensboro for the final series of the regular season needing one win – or one Greenville loss to Winston Salem – to clinch a playoff spot. If Bowling Green clinches, it would host Rome in a best-of-three series on Sept. 10.

“I would hope so,” Valenzuela said. “I would hope everything goes well and we get to celebrate, get in here and deliver a playoff game on (Sept. 10) to Bowling Green.”

First pitch for the series opener at Greensboro is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. CDT on Tuesday.{&end}