After the season’s rough beginning and a quick recovery, the Spartan softball team’s future was looking up, until the district tournament came around. The game against the Fort Zumwalt East Lions was the final showdown of the Spartan season. A game that should have been an easy win for the Spartans, turned out to be one of the biggest upsets of the season. The game was lost due to the Spartans biggest weakness.

“There were a lot of errors,” said senior Kristen Kolkmeyer. “We always have one bad inning that’ll do us in. One person will make an error and then everyone else will too.”

Throughout the season, these bad innings have cost the Spartans plenty of games, but none of those games were as important as this one. The game against FZE should have ended in Spartan victory, but after their bad inning, the Spartan’s 6-0 lead was lost and the game tied at 6-6. This inning left the Spartans shell shocked and after a few more errors, the Lions came back to win the game with a score of 9-6. According to senior Alyssa Mathis, the turnout of the game was a result of the team’s attitude after the errors began.

“We lost because [we] can’t move on after a bad play,” Mathis said. “We lost because of our attitude.”

While the Spartans had a good season up to districts, the loss against FZE was not the way the team dreamed it to end. According to senior Becca Stocker, this season did not turn out as well as planned.

“We were supposed to be district champs,” Stocker said. “The season just didn’t turn out as great as we hoped.”

As their final season comes to a close, senior Haley Allen reflects on the team’s performance as a whole.

“The beginning was a little rough, but we’ve come a long way,” Allen said. “We improved a lot, our team chemistry was a lot better, which is why districts was so disappointing. We came all that and lost a game we shouldn’t have.”

But while the end may not have been ideal, the team, especially the seniors are proud of their season. As for next season, on the other hand, the team is going to change drastically.

“Losing ten seniors is really going to hurt,” Allen said. “Next year will be a rough year as the new girls all gain experience.” Allen also explains that there are plenty of talented underclassmen who have potential to bring some strength to the team. “It could go either way, really.”

The Spartan softball team’s season came to a close after falling at districts, their final record was 13-13.