The Viking women’s softball team went 2-3 this weekend at the Midwest Conference Classic in Janesville. The event, hosted by Beloit College, featured all ten teams from the Midwest conference. Each South Division team played five games against teams from the North Division and vice versa.
Saturday saw the Vikings lose three close games to the top three teams from the South Division: Knox, Illinois College and Lake Forest. The first game of the day matched the Vikes up against Knox, who finished the tournament 5-0. In the third inning, the Vikings capitalized on Prairie Fire errors including a passed ball which scored Becca Reason. Lawrence took a 1-0 lead into the sixth behind the strong pitching of Lauren Kost, but Knox managed to get three runs in the bottom of the sixth. LU couldn’t get any runs in the seventh, resulting in a 3-1 loss. The Vikings then went on to play Lake Forest and Illinois College, losing both games 8-7. The Lake Forest game featured a five run, fifth inning comeback for the Vikings who took the division leading Foresters to extra innings before losing in the eighth on a Melissa Wenger RBI single.
Lawrence fared much better on Sunday. Lauren Kost pitched a three hit complete game shutout as the Vikings scored three in the sixth to defeat Monmouth College 3-0. Kost continued her dominance as the Vikings beat Grinnell 2-1 in extra innings. She also scored the winning run in the eighth inning. Combined, Kost was 2-0 on the day, allowing ten hits and just one earned run over the course of the two days. She didn’t walk a batter and struck out eight, and also went 1 for 4 from the plate and batted in a runner before scoring the winning run against Grinnell.
After a midweek clash at Ripon, the Vikings return home this weekend for a game against Finlandia University on Saturday and host the Green Knights of St. Norbert on Tuesday.