Despite an impressive season, Harmony softball’s playoff run ended with Thursday’s 6-0 loss to Melbourne High.
Led by head coach Kristi Mindrup, the Longhorns finished the year with a 14-6 record, the best in 8 seasons.
“This is my fifth year at Harmony and the first time we’ve made it past districts, so it means a lot,” Mindrup said. “This is a special group -- they’re very young. We only had one senior, so you haven’t seen the last of Harmony yet.”
The Longhorns. the Orange Belt Conference champions, made it to the class 6A quarterfinals through an at-large berth after fighting their way through a difficult district schedule.
“We played with a lot of heart; we played with gut; we played with grit,” Mindrup said. “We had a phenomenal regular season.”
Melbourne (22-2-1), district champs and ranked 6th in the state in 6A, put up an impressive performance, with pitchers Jasmine Francik and Kylah Berry striking out a combined 17 batters and shutting out the Longhorns, surrendering only one base hit to Amanda Whalen.
The Bulldogs took a quick lead in the first inning, with sophomore Alisha Thompson hitting a 2-run home run to deep right field.
While the loss, and the end of the season is disappointing for Mindrup and the team, they are already looking forward to next year and continuing their success.
“I’m looking for leadership from my junior class,” Mindrup said. “I believe strongly that if you have good leadership, you have good followers. That’s what we’re looking for next season. We’ll be in the weight room working out and doing what we need to do from now until then.”
