Ups and Downs For Softball This Week

With today's postponement of a scheduled doubleheader at Citrus College ends a wacky week of events for the Pasadena City College softball team. The Lancers went 1-2, including an 11-5 loss against El Camino Thursday at Robinson Park where both teams used the contest as if it were a Major League baseball exhibition game.

After El Camino jumped ahead 8-1 by the third inning, the teams started emptying their benches and before it was over, the teams combined to play 38 players. ECC replaced all 10 of its starting players to enter 20 into the non-conference contest while PCC snuck in 18 players.

PCC (3-5 overall) made a game of it as hot-hitting second baseman Alex Howard batted 2-for-4 with three RBI and shortstop Karina Moreno was 2-for-4 with a triple and two runs scored. Third baseman Brittany Ching (double) and centerfielder Angel Urbina each went 2-for-3. Relief pitcher Celina Mesa slowed down El Camino's heavy bats with 3.2 innings, allowing four hits and two earned runs. 

For El Camino (5-2), Haley Reed slugged a towering, 2-RBI home run over the left-center field fence as part of its 14 hits. 

On Thursday, Pica Madrid hurled six innings of 1-hit ball and Howard batted 3-for-4 with a double and two RBI as PCC blanked host LA Mission, 6-0. Destiny Rojas added a pinch-hit, 2-run single in the third inning for the Lancers offense. Designated player Jamie Hammon added two hits. 

On Tuesday, PCC played at old rival Cerritos, like El Camino no longer a member of the Lancers' conference opponents as the South Coast Conference has split into North and South Divisions this year with the addition of Rio Hondo and Chaffey to the new North. Pasadena plays in the North. 

The Lancers led 1-0, but Cerritos literally came away with a walk-off, 2-1 win on a bases-loaded walk with two outs in the bottom of the seventh inning. The game was a tense one with Moreno giving PCC a lead on a RBI single in the fifth. With the game tied in the seventh, a great relay throw by Howard to catcher Jeneve Medrano gunned a runner at home plate to keep it at 1-1. However, the Falcons drew three consecutive walks, the last by Kimberly Olivas to win it.

Angel Wintercorn pitched well overall for the Lancers as she hurled the complete game, allowing only two hits (and six walks) with five strikeouts. Cerritos' Kristen Voller gave up four hits and struck out seven. 

Coach Monica Tantlinger's Lancers will host Long Beach City College, another SCC South team, on Tuesday, Feb. 21 in a 2:30 p.m. first pitch at Robinson Park.