Fall Creek advances in regionals, regular season concludes
In soccer, whenever there's a match-up outside of league or cup play, it's called a "friendly"
No. 7 ranked Augusta had such a ballgame at No. 3 ranked Blair-Taylor on Thursday, May 21 and like their Dairyland Conference match-up with the Wildcats, the Beavers emerged again with a 2-0 win to finish the regular season at 18-6 overall. Augusta broke a 1-1 tie scoring a run in the seventh. Senior Rachel West had two hits to lead AHS
The Beavers, a No. 2 seed in its WIAA Division 4 regional tournament bracket, host No. 7 Mondovi on Tuesday, May 26 in the semifinals. In fact, all of the Tri-County Area's team are in the regional semis on Tuesday.
Fall Creek (10-15 overall) advanced there as the No. 7 seed Crickets won 11-8 over No. 10 seed Loyal/Greenwood in a Division 3 first round ballgame at FC on Thursday, May 21. The Crickets jumped out to an early 4-0 lead thanks to an error that scored sophomore Makayla Coleman, a double by sophomore Avery Ludescher which scored sophomore Lu Larscheid and another double by sophomore Ary Woodford which scored junior Kamryn Dahlberg and held on for the win as L/G rallied.
The week didn't start out too friendly for Augusta. They were upset by a red hot Independence/Gilmanton squad which has won four in a row by a 2-1 score at Independence. Augusta sophomore Rilee Bethke went 2-for-3, sophomore Haley Strauch went 2-for-4 and sophomore Laney O’Brien doubled. Junior Brooklyn Krueger went 7 innings in the circle, with only one earned run, and struck out nine. Twenty-four hours later the Beavers were beaten up by No.3 ranked Stanley-Boyd 10-1. Highlights for AHS were Krueger going 2-for-3 with a double and junior CeCe Schroeder hitting her second home run of the season. O’Brien took the loss for the Beavers, but only allowed three earned runs and struck out nine.
Eleva-Strum has a No. 4 seed and hosts Spring Valley on Tuesday. The Cardinals have won three of their last four to finish the regular season with back-to-back winning seasons for the first time in program history at 11-7 overall. E-S shutout Whitehall 7-0 on Monday, May 18 led by Ruby Bartholomew's 14 strikeouts that got her named WHTL 102.3 FM Player of the Game. She pitched a two-hitter and also had two of the Cards four hits while driving in three runs. After losing to No. 3 ranked Blair-Taylor on Tuesday, May 19 by a 5-1 score, Central pulled off its biggest win of the season upsetting No. 3 Auburndale on the road on Thursday, May 21.
Unlike the other Area teams Osseo-Fairchild (8-12) enters the playoffs on a losing streak which extended this week to five games. O-F fell in a close contest 5-4 at Melrose-Mindoro on Monday, May 18 and then fell in five innings at Mondovi 10-0 on Tuesday, May 19. The Thunder are off until Tuesday's D-4 regional semifinal as No. 6 seed at No. 3 Colfax. Eight errors proved costly to the Thunder against Mel-Min despite two hits and three RBIs for junior Emma Lyngen and two runs scored for freshman Addison Dunahay.
