As far as first-year coaches go, Nathan Thompson had a pretty easy go of it.

Thompson served as an assistant under former coach Bob Glass for two seasons before being promoted for this campaign, so nothing about the job was a surprise. The Bears (5-11, 3-1 area) on Thursday won their last home game of the season for Thompson, 16-3 over Verbena in five innings, then emptied a bucket of cold water on their coach.

“We just kind of picked up like nothing happened,” Thompson said about the coaching transition. “It’s been a good season.”

Billingsley took advantage of a shaky Verbena defense in the bottom of the first inning to take a 4-0 lead on two-run hits by Crystal Motley and Hannah Horton.

Verbena pushed two runs across in the top of the second inning when an Allyson Brown single scored Ashlie Shires and Katelyn Patterson, but the hosts got the runs right back in the bottom half of the inning on run-scoring hits by Kim Lawrence and Motley.

The Red Devils scored again in the top of the third on a Shires double, but Billingsley put the game away in the bottom half of the frame with five runs on five hits and two Verbena errors.

The Bears added five more runs in the fourth to conclude the scoring.

Summer Gaither was the winning pitcher, and Chanin Hancock suffered the loss.