Illinois suffers first loss at Senior League Softball World Series, remains top seed coming out of pool

ROXANA, Del. — The comeback kids nearly made it two rallies in a row.

One day after a walk-off single in the eighth inning kept the Illinois District 17 softball undefeated in pool play at the Senior League Softball World Series, the Land of Lincolners found themselves in a late-inning hole again Thursday.

The Central Region champions trailed 6-3 before scoring twice in the sixth, and after allowing the Netherlands to extend the lead back to three runs, Illinois scored on an error with two outs in the top of the seventh and brought the tying run to the plate. A strikeout ended the comeback and saddled Illinois with an 8-6 loss at Lyons Field.

The Land of Lincolners finished pool play with a 3-1 record and are the No. 1 seed in Pool B heading into single-elimination bracket play.

Illinois District 17 will face the fourth seed from Pool A, the team representing the Latin America Region, at 4:30 p.m. Friday at Bruce Layton Field. The winner advances to Saturday’s semifinals at 4:30 p.m. The championship game will be played at 6 p.m. Sunday.

Macomb’s Kylie Robinson and Havana’s Liz Waymire each went 2 for 3 for Illinois. Waymire doubled and scored twice. Brown County’s Taryn Moorman suffered the loss, allowing six runs and eight hits over four innings with four strikeouts and three walks.