{"id":1360,"date":"2025-05-18T11:19:34","date_gmt":"2025-05-18T11:19:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/2025\/05\/18\/lauren-derkowski-goes-down-swinging-in-curtain-call-of-michigan-career\/"},"modified":"2025-05-18T11:19:37","modified_gmt":"2025-05-18T11:19:37","slug":"lauren-derkowski-goes-down-swinging-in-curtain-call-of-michigan-career","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/2025\/05\/18\/lauren-derkowski-goes-down-swinging-in-curtain-call-of-michigan-career\/","title":{"rendered":"Lauren Derkowski goes down swinging in curtain call of Michigan career"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>AUSTIN, Texas \u2014 With the end of both the Michigan softball team\u2019s season and her illustrious career as a Wolverine looming, senior right-hander Lauren Derkowski did what she had done for four years \u2014 she fought.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>After pulling her at the top of the fourth inning of its NCAA Regional clash against Central Florida in favor of sophomore right-hander Erin Hoehn, Michigan called upon Derkowski yet again to save the day in the fifth, after the Knights tacked on three runs to wring back the lead. And, par for the course, she retired eight of Central Florida\u2019s next nine batters to keep the Wolverines alive. But the Wolverines\u2019 offense struggled to reciprocate, and as a result, bowed out of the Regional with a 10-8 defeat.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>But in giving Michigan a fighting chance until the very end, Derkowski gave a performance fitting of her body of work all week \u2014 and all career \u2014 long.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere\u2019s nobody we wanted to put the ball (in the hands of), other than Lauren Derkowski,\u201d Wolverines coach Bonnie Tholl said. \u201cAnd she was going to lead the charge. And we\u2019ve asked a lot of her in three plus years, and she has taken it.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-1    \">\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p>Michigan arguably owed its very presence in Austin to Derkowski. The Wolverines had entered the Big Ten Tournament as a No. 8 seed, off the back of a turbulent regular season, but played their best softball when it mattered most, rattling off four wins to defend their title. And Derkowski was the keystone of it all, pitching shutouts in monumental upset victories against No. 1-seed Oregon in the quarterfinals and No. 2-seed UCLA in the championship. Her stellar play earned her the tournament\u2019s Most Outstanding Player award for the second year in a row \u2014 and punched Michigan\u2019s automatic bid to the NCAA Regional.<\/p>\n<p>In the first game of the Regional on Friday, against the Knights, Derkowski\u2019s final act continued in style. After pitching the first four innings before making way for Hoehn, Derkowski was entrusted with saving the game again in the seventh inning. She threw three straight changeups \u2014 the pitch she had made her signature in her time with the Wolverines \u2014 to strike out UCF designated player Izzy Mertes and capture victory.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>When Michigan faced the Knights again on Saturday following a loss to Texas, Derkowski opened the matchup with a three-up, three-down inning, before allowing two earned runs over the next two innings. When she walked off the circle to make way for Hoehn in the fourth, she left the Wolverines with a lead.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>And when she returned in the fifth, she did everything in her power to regain it. Derkowski didn\u2019t strike a batter out all game, but she forced a lineout and a flyout of her next two batters and followed up with a three-up, three-down sixth inning. After allowing a single in the seventh inning, she followed it up by forcing a pop up to retire the Knights. In the two innings she pitched upon re-entry, she had given up only one hit and no runs.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>But Michigan failed to grasp the lifeline Derkowski had thrown them as its batters were retired in order in the bottom of the seventh.\u00a0<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-2    \">\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p>And with it, the Wolverines\u2019 season \u2014 and Derkowski\u2019s collegiate career \u2014 was over.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI wish that we could have done more for her today and played better for her today,\u201d Tholl said. \u201cBut she\u2019s left her mark on Michigan softball.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It was far from the ending Derkowski wanted. A reprise of the NCAA Regional loss she and Michigan suffered at the hands of the Knights in her freshman year meant that she\u2019ll never have a chance to do what some of her predecessors, like Jennie Ritter or Hailey Wagner, did, and pitch in the Women\u2019s College World Series.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>But that doesn\u2019t take away her 60 career wins or 2.34 career ERA, or her back-to-back Big Ten Tournament Most Outstanding Player awards, or the litany of other accolades collected.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s been an honor to represent Michigan,\u201d Derkowski said. \u201c\u2026 I love this school. I love these people. And there\u2019s no place I\u2019d rather spend my four years.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-3    \">\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p>And in her final two innings as a Wolverine, Derkowski turned in a performance that demonstrated just why she\u2019ll be remembered by those associated with Michigan softball for years to come.<\/p>\n<aside>\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p><h3 class=\"jp-relatedposts-headline\"><em>Related articles<\/em><\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>AUSTIN, Texas \u2014 With the end of both the Michigan softball team\u2019s season and her illustrious career as a Wolverine looming, senior right-hander Lauren Derkowski did what she had done for four years \u2014 she fought.\u00a0 After pulling her at the top of the fourth inning of its NCAA Regional clash against Central Florida in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1361,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[1512,1513,1511,787,266,222,1510],"class_list":{"0":"post-1360","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-call","9":"tag-career","10":"tag-curtain","11":"tag-derkowski","12":"tag-lauren","13":"tag-michigan","14":"tag-swinging"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1360","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1360"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1360\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1362,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1360\/revisions\/1362"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1361"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1360"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1360"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1360"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}