Sophomore pitcher Meghan Joyce earned her first career victory in the Foresters' 5-4 triumph over Ithaca College on Thursday. They fell 6-5 in eight innings to Wheaton College in their second game of the day.
Joyce came on in relief of junior Shaye Gauthier and got the final out of the top of the sixth inning before holding the Bombers scoreless in the seventh.
Lake Forest had taken the early lead with four runs in the bottom of the second inning. Senior Haylee Sherlund bunted in the first and, two batters later, senior Sydney Wyatt belted a two-run double. Gauthier added a run-scoring single to make the score 4-0.
Ithaca cut the deficit in half with a pair of tallies in the top of the third and closed to within one in the fourth. The Bombers tied the score in the top of the sixth but Gauthier put the Foresters back on top with a two-out RBI double in the bottom of the frame. Gauthier and Wyatt accounted for all five of their team's hits in the contest.
In Lake Forest's second game of the day, a Wheaton error and wild pitch brought home a couple of Foresters in the top of the first inning and a sacrifice fly by Kalnicky in the second made it a three-run lead.
After the Thunder scored five times in the bottom of the second, Lake Forest freshman Brie Gauthier hit her second homer of the season in the third and junior Nicole Schussler doubled in a run to tie the score in the fourth.
Brie Gauthier took over in the circle with two outs in the second inning and kept Wheaton off the scoreboard until surrendering a run-scoring double in the eighth. She struck out four batters and surrendered just two hits and a walk in five-and-a-third innings of work.
Schussler and Brie Gauthier each had two of the Foresters' nine base hits in the game.
After winning twice on the first day of the season, Lake Forest has split games five times and is 7-5 on the year. Ithaca fell to 2-5 while Wheaton improved to 4-4.
The Foresters will play two more games in Florida on Friday, taking on the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point at 4:00 p.m. (ET) and Nebraska Wesleyan University afterwards at 6:15.
