The MHSAA softball playoffs are almost here, and although Warren Central fell in its last matchup, there’s still a lot to be excited about.

The Lady Vikes will take on Southaven in the first round. Game 1 of the best-of-three series is Friday at Southaven at 5:30 p.m. Games 2 and 3 will be played as a doubleheader Saturday at Warren Central, beginning at 4 p.m.

The Lady Vikes fell 5-2 to Florence in their regular-season finale on Tuesday, but went into the sixth inning up 1-0.  The loss didn’t sting as much as normal for the Lady Vikes, as it showcased the continued improvement that they’ve been seeing recently.

Kelsey Lockridge was among the bright spots for Warren Central, going 2-for-3 and one run scored.

“I say last night and tonight, we played better than we have in the last few weeks,” Warren Central coach Dana McGivney said.  “So I feel like we’re starting the playoffs on the right note. Definitely would’ve liked to have come out with a win tonight, but we didn’t put our heads down, we didn’t quit, we didn’t make very many errors against a really good team, so I’ll take that.”

Warren Central heads into the playoffs with a 9-12 record, while Southaven is 11-10. The Lady Vikes are 3-2 over their last five, including a one-run loss to Richland and Tuesday’s game against Florence that got away late.

Southaven had won three games in a row before dropping its regular-season finale to Desoto Central. The Chargers scored 47 runs during their three-game winning streak.

McGivney said she was still compiling a scouting report on Southaven, but that some things are a given no matter the opponent once the playoffs come around.

“Pretty much like any team you’re going to meet in the playoffs, they’re going to make plays and do the things they need to do and hopefully we’ll be able to put pressure on them,” McGivney said. “Hopefully they’ll make errors whenever we put pressure on them defensively and we can score some runs and win a game.”

With the most important part of their season thus far coming up this weekend, McGivney wanted to see the Lady Vikes keep building on the areas they’d shown improvement in recently, and said her squad was trending in the right direction.

“We’re just working on cutting down on our errors, which I think we’ve done the last couple of days, and hitting,” McGivney said after the loss to Florence. “We’ve been improving our hitting the last two games, and the pitcher we faced tonight was a pretty good pitcher, so I’ll take the effort tonight that we had.”