Tuesday night began with seven area schools still alive in the IHSAA softball tournament.

Three are still alive.

It’s not unusual for Penn, as Beth Zachary’s Lady Kingsmen won their 12th consecutive regional crown, pounding Northern Indiana Conference rival Elkhart, 11-2.  Charlie Swigert rapped four of Penn’s 16 hits, while Addison Bogunia led the RBI parade with three. The Kingsmen will face top-ranked Lake Central in the semistate opener at Lafayette Harrison Saturday.

It was quite a different story in Class 3A, as John Glenn survived a pitcher’s duel with Tippecanoe Valley, winning 1-0, to claim the school’s first softball regional crown. Freshmen were huge for the Falcons. Emma Thomas was brilliant in the circle, scattering six hits while fanning four and walking none. Meanwhile her classmate Mia Wilton went 3-for-3, scoring the game’s only run on a single, followed by a walk, stole third and scoring on Payton Thomas’ sacrifice fly. Glenn moves on to the Twin Lakes semistate, facing East Noble at 1 p.m Saturday.

Both of our area 2A teams were eliminated. Western Boone scored three in the 7th and two in the 8th to knock out Rochester, 8-6, while Andrean’s Ashlyn Hite hit for the cycle as the 59ers beat Jimtown, 9-1.

South Central reaches the 1A semistate for the second straight year, after the Satellites bashed Fremont, 12-2. Grace Shukitis homered and drove in three, while Caitlin Allen also had three hits and three RBI.  Tony Wallace’s team now meets North Newton Saturday at Frontier.

Teams need two wins on Saturday to advance to the state finals June 12-13 at Purdue’s Bittinger Stadium.