Lady Eagles season comes to a close

By Lucas Wright

The Lady Eagles softball team’s season came to a close on May 20, against Carterville with a 14-1 heartbreaking loss. This loss capped their regional run to the semi-finals, which included a huge 5-4 win against A-J.

The Lady Eagles may have finished off their season with a 12-18 record, but the team did have their bright spots.

The Lady Eagles logged huge wins which included a 24-3 win against Pope County on April 30, another blowout win on March 24, against Cobden 18-5, and finally a 20-0 rout of the Pharaohs of Egyptian on March 22.

These were two of the biggest blowout wins of the year, but there were also close, hard fought victories along the way for the Lady Eagles.

One of the most prominent of these was the 4-3 win at Crab Orchard on March 26, which featured breakout performances on the offensive end by Maranda Chance and in the circle by Lexie Harper.

The Lady Eagles were led throughout the season offensively by senior Maranda Chance, who led the team in batting average, RBIs, runs, hits and slugging percentage. Besides Maranda, the Lady Eagles had a .369 hitter in the lead-off spot in Katie White and two other players hitting over .300 in Rachel Kindhart and Breanna Russell.

These offensive leaders helped the Lady Eagles to average over six runs per game over the regular season.

Looking back on their season, coach Marc Palmer said, “We had a good year, the kids worked hard and played some great softball. I’m going to miss this year’s seniors, but we have a lot of talented players coming back next year, and I’m looking forward to the competition we have in front of us.”