Hillsdale softball ends 34-year CCS drought

“Champions recognize the moment,” Madison, Hillsdale’s former baseball manager, told the Knights from the side railing of the dugout.

Hillsdale responded, scoring three runs in the inning to propel the top-seeded Knights to a 4-1 win Saturday morning at West Valley College in Saratoga.

It is the first CCS softball title for top-seeded Hillsdale (19-9-1) since head coach Randy Metheany and star pitcher Maureen Brady led the Knights to the 1991 crown.

“[Winning the championship is] huge,” said Hillsdale senior tri-captain Lexi Kuka, who had a pinch-hit RBI single during the fifth inning rally and was three-year starter before her senior year was marred by injury.

“I don’t think it’s sunk in yet.”

Madison’s quick speech seemed to pay dividends as Mia DeMartini opened the bottom of the fifth with a single to center and then promptly stole second on the first pitch to clean-up hitter Lola Jones.

It was an important theft as Jones pulled the next pitch over the third-base bag and into left field to score DeMartini from second for the go-ahead run and a 2-1 lead.

After a foulout and a popout, San Mateo seemed poised to get out of the inning when G Brum hit a routine grounder to short.

But the shortstop bobbled the ball and threw late to first to keep the Knights alive with runners at the corners. Maddie Peña drew a walk to load the bases and Hillsdale head coach Eryn Butcher went to her bench, summoning Kuka to pinch hit.

It’s been a bittersweet year for Kuka. She had to twice undergo ankle surgery last June and just got out of the medical boot just as the Knights’ season was starting. She was finally ready to play midway through the year, but opportunities were fleeting.

But she certainly took advantage of the situation. Cold off the bench without any warning, Kuka found herself quickly in an 0-2 hole. after taking a ball, she knocked the next pitch into right field for an RBI single and a 3-1 lead.

“[Kuka has] struggled not being on the field. Finding an opportunity for her was really big today,” Butcher said. “I didn’t tell her beforehand. I just wanted her to get up there and react.

“You can’t write a better story.”

Leadoff hitter Sophia Shelton capped the rally with an RBI single to center to finish out the scoring for the game.

From there, Jones finally settled down in the circle. The sophomore was wobbly for most of the game, but she retired six of the last seven batters she faced and her sixth strikeout of the game sealed the victory.

The matchup Saturday morning certainly lived up to the championship billing as the game was close throughout. And seventh-seeded San Mateo (16-10) — despite featuring five sophomores and four freshmen in the starting lineup from a roster that features no upperclassmen — certainly were not just happy to be there, as the Bearcats pushed the Knights to the brink.

San Mateo leadoff hitter Alice Han definitely was not fazed by the moment as she smacked an 0-2 pitch down the left-field line to lead off the game with a double.

But Han was cut down at the plate when Hillsdale third baseman G Brum fielded a sharp grounder off the bat of Jana Davies and hit catcher Sammie Marinec, who swiped the tag on Han.

Hillsdale, meanwhile, was having a hard time squaring up San Mateo starter Anushka Singh. But Singh was struggled, hitting two of the first three batters she faced. She worked into the third inning before giving way to Celia Hernandez, who went the final 3 2/3 innings.

But Singh gave up only one run on two hits and the game was tied when she came out.

Butcher believed that some her hitter’s struggles were because of Singh’s issues.

“She seemed like she was struggling with her command,” Butcher said, adding that her team did better against Hernandez because she was more consistently around plate.

Despite that, it was Hillsdale that took a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the second. Peña was hit by a pitch and Paige Venezia, the No. 9 hitter, followed with an infield hit before Shelton put the Knight ahead with an opposite-field, RBI-single to right to drive in Peña for the 1-0 lead.

The Bearcats got the run right back in the top of the third. Han led off the inning by blasting a frozen rope over the fence, just left of the 220-foot sign in center field. The Bearcats got runners as far as second base in the fourth, fifth and seventh innings, but couldn’t come up with the big hit.

The game was so low-scoring because of stellar defense from both sides. Two runners were thrown out at the plate. In addition to the Knights’ play in the first, San Mateo center fielder Davies gunned down courtesy runner Liana Mack at the plate on a Taylor O’Mahony single, to keep the game tied at 1-all in the bottom of the third.

In the top of the third Venezia, another of Hillsdale’s three senior captains, made the defensive play of the game. A ball off the bat of Aliyah Scheller looked destined to be dumped into no-man’s land in the shallow left-center field gap.

Left fielder O’Mahony was not going to get to it, but Venezia came flying in from her center field spot, making a diving catch for the second out of the inning.

In the fifth Marinec, the last of the Knights’ tri-captains, flashed some leather. With San Mateo’s Rachel Warner on first, Singh came up and barely got a piece of the ball, popping it up about three feet off the ground, right above home plate.

Marinec didn’t have time to even come out of her crouch, jabbing her catcher’s mitt on top of the plate and making the catch for the first out of the inning.

Two more Jones strikeouts got the Knights out of the jam.

“We finished strong,” Kuka said. “This has been a dream of mine for a long time.”