Mariposa’s varsity girls’ softball squad scratched and clawed to hold onto a third place finish in the Southern Athletic League and gain a playoff berth.

It opened the first round of the Sac-Joaquin Section Division VI playoffs last Thursday in Lodi and trumped Forest Lake Christian, 2- 0, in eight innings to advance to Saturday’s semi-final contest. There the Lady Grizzlies tangled with Capitol Christian, and were eliminated, 5-3, as the team was plagued by the same errors they haunted most of their regular season.

Capitol Christian jumped in front with a pair of runs in the bottom of the first inning, scoring on three Mariposa miscues to take the early lead. The Eagles added a run in the bottom of the second inning on a solo home run, and scored another run in the bottom of the third on yet another Lady Grizzly error.

Mariposa got on the scoreboard with two runs in the top of the fourth frame. Junior catcher Haley Guenthart drew a walk, but was put out at second when freshman Brittany Binnewies reached on a fielder’s choice. Riyn Williams walked, and senior Brook Barrett was hit by a pitch to load the bases. Brook Earling stepped to the plate and lined a double to rightfield, scoring Binnewies and Williams to close the gap to 4-2.

In the fifth inning, Capital Christian padded its lead with another solo home run.

The Lady Grizzlies attempted to rally in the seventh inning, but fell short. Barrett reached first safely and then stole second. The Eagles mishandled the throw to second, and Barrett advanced to third. She scored when the throw to third base rolled into the Eagles’ dugout on another error, but Mariposa couldn’t narrow the gap.

In the first round against Forest Lake Christian, it was freshman Carissa Leonard who kept Mariposa in the playoffs.

Ella-Rose Thorpe singled, and senior shortstop Morgan Foley reached first on an error in leftfield. Leonard ripped a two-out double down the third base line to score both runners and put the Mariposa win on the books.

“It was a real pitchers’ duel,” said head coach Mike Brocchini. “There were 35 strikeouts in this game, and Nichole (Johnson) got 16 of them. Every inning was ‘Ks’ and there were only five hits in the whole game.”

Mariposa’s sophomore ace, Johnson, picked up the win, but was tagged with the loss against Capital Christian, even though she gave up just three hits, two of which were home runs.

“It think we finished up around .500 for the season,” Brocchini said. “We really need to work on our offense some more. We don’t back up our pitchers very well. We aren’t putting enough runs on the board.”

“This has been a challenging season,” Brocchini added. “We only had two seniors on the team, but next year looks good with two strong starting pitchers coming back in Nichole and Brittany.