A lackluster season ended with a flourish for Warren Central.

The Lady Vikes had one of their best hitting performances of the year and endured two thrilling games that went down to the final out in a first-round Class 6A playoff series against Petal on Wednesday. In the end, though, a late comeback bid couldn’t overcome a multitude of defensive miscues.

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Petal scored five unearned runs and eliminated the Lady Vikes with an 8-7 victory in Game 3 of the best-of-three series at Lucy Young Field. Warren Central (7-19) scored three runs in the bottom of the seventh but left the tying run at second base.

Petal won Game 1 of the series 7-5, while WC took the second game 11-5.

“It’s a shame. It was three good ballgames. We played better tonight than we had all season. We hit better tonight than we had all season,” WC coach Lucy Young said. “The kids just played their hearts out. It was a good battle.”

After Petal rallied for three runs in the top of the seventh inning to win Game 1, Warren Central came out swinging in Game 2. The Lady Vikes scored six runs in the top of the first, added to the lead in each of the next three innings, and coasted home for a comfortable win to even the series. WC had 20 hits, one of the few times this season it has truly hit well.

Blair Thornton, one of only two seniors on the team, was 3-for-4 with two RBIs for WC in Game 2. All 11 players in the starting lineup had at least one hit. Ten of the 11 either had an RBI or scored a run.

The hot hitting continued in Game 3. After two scoreless innings, Alexis Patterson drove a bases-clearing double to the gap in left center to give WC a 3-0 lead. Petal answered right back, though. Chelsea Paige’s two-run double, along with RBI singles by Samantha Miller and Nikki Cooley, put the Lady Panthers a 4-3 lead after 3 1/2 innings.

Petal (12-9-1) added three more runs in the fifth and one in the seventh to stretch its lead to 8-4 heading into the bottom of the seventh. Petal turned eight WC errors into five unearned runs, including the single run in the seventh inning that turned out to be the difference in the game.

WC also left the bases loaded in the fifth inning, and got only one run in the sixth after loading the bases with one out.

“It was one of those things that’s almost contagious. One does it and it almost spreads to the others,” Young said of the errors, which were committed by five different players. “We were playing a little ahead of ourselves. Trying to make a throw before we had the ball.”

Despite their self-inflicted wounds, the Lady Vikes made things interesting in the bottom of the seventh.

Two singles and an error brought in one run, and a two-run single by Thornton cut it to 8-7. With runners on first and second and two outs, though, Cooley got WC senior outfielder Kylie Wells to hit a sharp grounder to short. Paige fielded it cleanly and made a strong, accurate throw to second for the game-ending force out.

Afterward, Young was disappointed with the outcome — of the game and the season — but not with the effort of her team.

“That’s the way this group has been. After we’ve been getting beat, they’re eager to practice the next day. I appreciate that,” Young said.

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Contact Ernest Bowker at ebowker@vicksburgpost.com