The Lake Forest College softball team was defeated 7-0 on Friday by the College of St. Benedict, the 13th-ranked team in the nation, in an elimination game at the NCAA Division III Regional Tournament at Luther College.
The Foresters had several chances to score in the game, putting a pair of runners on base in four of the seven innings and stranding nine in the contest. Seven players on the team had a base hit with sophomore first baseman Riley Frisbie's sixth-inning double the only one going for extra bases.
St. Benedict was extremely successful with two outs, plating three runs under those circumstances in the first inning and two more in the third. The Blazers added an additional insurance run in the fourth and another in the sixth.
Three Lake Forest pitchers saw action in the game, beginning with freshman Shaye Gauthier, who was in the circle for the first three innings and suffered her only loss of the season. Classmate Maddie Webb recorded the next five outs and sophomore Missy Dieckman-Meyer the final seven. The only tally allowed by Webb was unearned and Dieckman-Meyer struck out four while surrendering one run.
The Midwest Conference champion Foresters finished the season with an overall record of 29-13. The team's only seniors are second baseman Kay Beall, leftfielder Sydney Gardner, and first baseman Megan Dahlinger. The three have helped lead the team to 116 victories in their careers, the most of any four-year span in program history.
