MILLIGAN COLLEGE, Tenn. (April 23, 2016) â€" Nine seniors were honored for their careers prior to Saturday's doubleheader, but the Milligan College softball team lost twice to No. 9 Georgia Gwinnett College, 5-0 and 9-5, on Anglin Field in the regular-season finale.
 
Jessica Connatser, Amanda Dunaway, Jessica Goodson, Lacey Huskins, Samantha Lilley, Emilee Rogers, Natalie Sheffey, Caroline Testerman, Jessica Wheelock and the rest of the Buffs will now turn their attention to the Appalachian Athletic Conference tournament, which will begin next week at Brickyard Park in Kingsport.
 
Goodson threw her sixth complete game of the season in game one to help Milligan keep it close, but the visiting Grizzlies put up four runs in the top of the sixth to pull away. Goodson had gone through the first 3.1 innings without allowing a hit, pitched and fielded her way out of some trouble in the fourth and fifth, but started to come undone in the sixth. Georgia Gwinnett posted four runs on five hits in that inning alone, and it proved to be more than enough for starter Ashley Beyke who pitched a shutout of her own.
 
Goodson's final line was seven innings, eight hits, five runs, four earned runs, three walks and two strikeouts. Wheelock had a good game at the plate going 2-for-2, and the senior followed that up with another two-hit effort in game two.
 
Wheelock's first hit of game two came as part of a rally in the fourth inning when the Buffs were climbing back from an early deficit of 6-1. It scored Kacie Skeen and set up a bases-loaded situation where the Buffs scored two more to cut it to 6-4. Sheffey and Lilley both had RBI's in their at-bats in the fourth inning, but the rally came to an end when Robinson missed a grand slam by a couple of feet.
 
What looked to be Robinson's fifth home run of the season was instead a running catch on the warning track that ended the inning. Milligan put up another threat in the sixth inning with Wheelock and Sheffey leading off with back-to-back hits, but the Buffs again came up short.
 
Kassi Butcher and Robinson shared the pitching duties with Butcher going the first two and Robinson pitching the last five. Butcher suffered the loss and saw her record move to 7-5 during her freshman season.
 
Milligan begins the AAC tournament on Tuesday, April 26, as the number five seed, and the Buffs will face four seed Truett-McConnell College at 11 a.m. Full tournament bracket will be released by the AAC.