Box Score Launching softballs over the fence of the Van Steenderen Softball Diamond worked pretty well for awhile.  After hitting nine home runs in the first four games of the NCAA Division III Softball Championship Great Lakes Regional in Whitewater, Wis., the No. 22 Carthage College softball team (33-12) ran out of oomph on Sunday, May 12 with a 3-2 loss to CCIW-opponent North Central College (35-11) in the regional semifinals.  The Cardinals hit three solo home runs to power the victory.  With the win, North Central advanced to Sunday's championship round against Luther College, but the Cardinals (35-12) fell to the Norse (32-9), 7-0, in the championship game.
 
The Lady Reds, seeded fourth in the regional, lost their first-round game on Thursday, May 9, 6-4, to fifth-seeded and No. 18 Luther College (29-9).  On the same side of the eight-team regional bracket, top-seeded and No. 11 Wisconsin-Whitewater (32-5) defeated eighth-seeded Finlandia (25-7), 6-1, in Thursday's first game.  On the other side of the bracket, CCIW-member and sixth-seeded North Central College (33-10) knocked off third-seeded and No. 24 Wisconsin-Eau Claire (26-8), 12-10, on Thursday, with second-seeded, CCIW-member and No. 21 Illinois Wesleyan University (32-9) outlasting seventh-seeded Benedictine University (Ill., 26-13), 7-6, on Friday, May 10. 
 
Carthage eliminated Finlandia University (25-8), 10-2, in Friday's second game.  Wisconsin-Eau Claire (27-8) eliminated Benedictine (Ill., 26-14), 5-1, in Friday's third game, with Luther (30-9) edging Wisconsin-Whitewater (32-6) by a 5-4 margin in the final game of the second day.  On Saturday, May 11, North Central (Ill., 34-10) defeated Illinois Wesleyan (32-10), 7-4; Wisconsin-Eau Claire (28-8) eliminated the host team, Wisconsin-Whitewater (32-7), 4-0; Carthage (31-12) eliminated Illinois Wesleyan (32-11), 4-3; Luther (31-9) defeated North Central (Ill., 34-11), 4-1, in the battle between the two undefeated teams; and Carthage (32-12) eliminated Wisconsin-Eau Claire (28-9) by a 7-0 margin.
 
The Carthage-North Central games was the fourth meeting this year between the two teams but the first Carthage loss.  The Lady Reds swept the regular-season doubleheader in Naperville, Ill., and won a 3-2 game over the Cardinals in the CCIW Softball Tournament in Kenosha, Wis.
 
In the loss to North Central, the Cardinals took a 1-0 lead in the second inning on a solo home run by Kiertsen Tinkoff.  The home-run attack continued in the third inning when Vlasta Mangia and Amanda Walker connected on back-to-back solo shots to put North Central up, 3-0.  Carthage's Bryanna Heckel got to third base with two outs in the sixth but was thrown out trying to score on a wild pitch. 

The Lady Reds mounted a serious rally in the seventh.  After scratching out only one hit off Cardinal pitcher Vlasta Mangia over the first six and one-third innings, Katie Morman and Abby Hanson hit back-to-back doubles with one out in the seventh.  Hanson's two-bagger scored Morman.  Olivia Scott singled Hanson to third.  Alyse Mikolas popped up on an infield fly for the second out, but Amy Slattery scored pinch-runner A.J. Grigsby on an infield grounder to make it a 3-2 game.  Mangia induced an infield grounder from Jen Precht for the final out of the game.  Mangia (25-7) allowed two runs on four hits and two walks, while losing pitcher Krystina Leazer (Sr., Des Plaines, Ill./Elk Grove, 23-6) gave up three runs on four hits and a walk over six innings. 
 
"We made good contact at the plate," said Carthage coach Amy Gillmore, "but we may have been a little anxious.  Vlasta Mangia kept us off-guard over six innings.  If Vicki Pyan's fly out to open the seventh inning had fallen in, or if we could have scored on the wild pitch in the sixth, it would have been a little more exciting.  Three pitches to North Central and three home runs were the difference.  We didn't put anything together until the last inning.  We just didn't have any other scoring opportunities.  You have to tip your hat to them.  North Central just had a little bit more than we did today, but I'm proud of what we did this year and what we accomplished at this regional.  We've reached the regional semifinals two years in a row—maybe next year we can take it step farther."