A dry spell of more than seven minutes to start the second half proved to be too much for the Lakeland College women's basketball team to recover from in a 74-62 loss to Edgewood College Tuesday night in its regular season finale at the Moose & Dona Woltzen Gymnasium.

The Muskies were held scoreless for the first 7:27 of the second half, and that stretch was the difference in the game as the Eagles turned a two-point halftime edge into a 14-point margin. As a result, Edgewood clinched the sixth seed in the upcoming Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference Tournament, while Lakeland was relegated to the seventh seed.

The Muskies (10-15 overall, 9-11 NACC) now will face No. 2 seed Benedictine (Ill.) University on Saturday at 7 p.m. in Lisle, Ill. Lakeland will have a chance to reprise its win at the buzzer over Benedictine just this past weekend. Edgewood will travel to take on third-seeded Milwaukee School of Engineering on Saturday.

The visiting Eagles (12-13 overall, 11-9 NACC) helped their own cause tremendously with their best shooting performance of the season. Edgewood looked nothing like a team coming into the game shooting 34.3% for the season, or like the squad that shot 25.4% in its last game against Aurora on Saturday.

The Eagles shot 46.0%, making 29 of 63 field goals. That mark included 48.4% marksmanship in the decisive second half, when the visitors shot 15 of 31.

In contrast, Lakeland shot just 9 of 26 in the second half (34.6%) and 21 of 55 for the game (38.2%). The Muskies also committed 22 turnovers, which Edgewood turned into 32 points.

Lakeland trailed 37-35 at halftime after a first 20 minutes that featured several wild swings. The Muskies opened an early nine-point lead, then went on to trail by nine before closing the first half on a 7-0 run that included a three-pointer by Bailey Grayvold (So.-Norway, Mich.) just before the break.

Lakeland seemingly went to halftime with all of the momentum, but never quite had the same energy in the second half. The Muskies missed their first seven field goals of the second half and also committed four turnovers in those first 7 1/2 minutes as Edgewood built a 49-35 lead.

A 10-0 run got Lakeland back in the game, with Trista Barron (Jr.-Escanaba, Mich.) making to free throws to make it 51-47 with 10:28 to play. The Eagles scored eight straight points, though, and the lead ballooned to as much as 18 and never fell below double digits again.

Grayvold scored 23 points, including 18 in the first half. The sophomore guard was 7 of 15 from the field and also made all nine of her free throw attempts. Mikayla Hilton (So.-Port Washington, Wis.) scored 11 points off the bench and Rachel Stankevich (Fr.-Goodman, Wis.) added 10 points and 14 rebounds.

Rachel Pope scored 22 points to lead Edgewood. Mariah Hill added 18 points and six assists and hit 7 of 10 shots.