Jun 9, 2013 By Aaron Thompson for The 3 min read

EVERETT — For nearly five innings Saturday it looked like the Carmichaels softball team might find a way to pull out another victory like they have so often done over the past handful of years.

Pitcher Erica Burns was cruising and the Lady Mikes were clinging to a one-run lead.

However, Southern Huntingdon scored all of its six runs over the final three innings, overcoming two deficits and pulling away to defeat the Lady Mikes, 6-2, in the PIAA quarterfinals Saturday afternoon.

The loss marks the second-straight year that the Carmichaels softball team has seen a very successful season end in the state playoffs at Everett. The Lady Mikes finished up with a 22-4 record.

The senior class for Carmichaels has played an instrumental part in the remarkable run for the program.

The five seniors lengthy list of accomplishments includes two WPIAL runner-up finishes, four section titles, a 75-10 career record and not a single home loss over the past four seasons.

Those numbers won’t do much to take the sting out of Saturday’s loss for a while though for Morgan Berardi, Regina Menhart, Lindsey Osborne, Rachael Hathaway and Anna Cree.

“The senior class took our program to the next level,” said Carmichaels coach Dave Briggs. “I told the girls there is only going to be one team happy at the end of this. We were playing softball on June 8 so that is something (to be proud of).”

Things looked promising for Carmichaels early on, as the Mikes offense got on the board first in the bottom half of the first inning. Back-to-back Mikes reached bases in the first to set up shop. A clutch RBI single from Menhart helped the Lady Mikes strike first for a 1-0 lead.

After that the bats went quiet. Carmichaels had two runners on and just one out in the first but couldn’t put a dent in the scoreboard as the next two hitters were retired.

The Lady Mikes then nursed the one-run lead until the fifth inning. Kara Leonard reached on a defensive error to bring home the tying run with two outs.

Burns continued a productive day offensively with her second of three hits, driving home Hathaway with a RBI single in the bottom frame to retake the lead right back at 2-1. That however was the last time the Lady Mikes had a lead or scored in the contest.

Southern Huntingdon used two runs to push ahead at 3-2 in the top of the sixth before putting the contest away with three more in the seventh, making it 6-2. Carmichaels put two runners on in the seventh inning but failed to push a run across.

“We kicked a few balls around and they got a few hits here and there,” Briggs said. “We knew they were a good hitting team and it was going to hard to hold them down. We knew we had to score some runs to beat them. We just couldn’t get the big hit.”

The loss kept the Lady Mikes from getting a shot at a WPIAL title game rematch against Neshannock in the PIAA semifinals.