A daunting path to the title
Las Vegas Robertson heads to winners bracket, SFIS to consolation bracket as weather wreaks havoc
Patience was a virtue tested several times Wednesday.
Santa Fe Indian School simply had to wait for its pitch.
West Las Vegas couldn’t wait long enough for its opportunity.
Las Vegas Robertson had to wait 10 days to do what the Lady Cardinals do best.
And, as has been the case for the past month, the weather tested every softball fan’s patience for the first day of the state tournament at Rio Rancho Cleveland.
SFIS, the 10th seed in the Class 4A bracket, survived an extrainnings affair with West Las Vegas, using a walk-off walk by Leanna Lewis to secure an 8-7 win in eight innings in the play-win round of the tournament. Lewis’ free pass was the last of three in the eighth by Lady Dons pitcher Jade Ulibarri, but the junior almost forgot the most important part of a walk-
off moment.
Lewis paused for a moment as winning runner Diandra Toya crossed home plate, before realizing she had to go to first base to complete the rally.
“I breathed the biggest sigh of relief,” Lewis said. “Then, I almost forgot to walk to first. I just refocused and stepped on first.”
That was just the start of a long day for the Lady Braves. They followed that with a quarterfinal tussle with No. 2 Las Vegas Robertson, but the rested Lady Cardinals were more than ready to finally play after a 10-day layoff. Led by junior pitcher Kendra Duran’s twohitter, Robertson rolled to a 10-0 mercy-rule win in five innings.
The Lady Cardinals (20-6) head to the winner’s bracket semifinals, where they play Portales at 8:30 a.m. at Rio Rancho High School.
The Lady Cardinals shook off the rust of a long rest by the fourth inning, scoring three times in the fourth inning to open a 7-0 lead. They added another “3-spot” to the scoreboard in the fifth, capped by Samantha Montano’s sacrifice fly that scored Makayla Quintana with the 10th and final run of the game.
Moving to the consolation bracket, SFIS (15-10) waited through two rain delays and got in just a half-inning of its win-orgo-home game against Ruidoso before a wet field forced postponement of the consolation bracket game to Thursday morning at 8:30 a.m.
That leads to the possibility the Lady Braves could play three games Thursday before reaching the consolation final to vie for a spot in the 4A championship game on Friday.
SFIS head coach Leroy Valencia knows the difficulty of doing that, as he was the pitching coach for St. Michael’s in 2009 when it won four games on the final day of the season before losing the “if ” game of the then-3A state championship to Bloomfield.
The prospect of taking such a daunting path to the championship game was disappointing to Valencia, although he expressed no reservation about postponing the consolation game.
“I think we could do something a little bit better,” Valencia said. “Maybe they have scheduling problems [for umpiring crews on Thursday], I don’t know. But there’s got to be a better way to go.”
The morning play-in game saw the Lady Braves rally from a 3-0 deficit to take a 5-3 lead in the fourth before the Lady Dons responded with a pair of runs in the top of the fifth to tie the score and set the stage for a taut eighth inning.
The Lady Dons got first crack. Using “California” rules in which the last batter to record an out in the previous inning starts at second base in the extra stanza, West Las Vegas broke the tie when Andrea Ulibarri lofted a fly ball that SFIS centerfielder Alyssa Valencia dropped, allowing Marquisa Montoya to score.
The Lady Dons put runners at first and third with one out when the Lady Braves caught a break. Amri Lucero was called out for attempting to steal second base before SFIS pitcher Shannon Ortiz released her pitch, and that quelled the threat.
SFIS responded with a run when Caitlyn Cruz’s RBI single scored Zoe Martinez, but the turning point came when a substitution error appeared to hurt the Lady Braves. Lady Dons head coach Pamela Sandoval pointed out to the home-plate umpire that Valencia did not properly substitute Lauren Bekise for Raven Alcott to start the seventh inning.
Valencia said the official scorekeeper believed that Bekise was a “flex” player, meaning she could not bat, but he insisted it was a straight-up substitution. Regardless, Bekise had to take a seat and let Camilla Lewis finish the at-bat, and she drew a walk.
“I liked that they kept their composure,” Valencia said of his team. “That was big.”
Had Sandoval waited to appeal until Bekise reached base because of the at-bat, Bekise would have been ruled out. When Ortiz followed with a popup to first base, the error loomed larger. Instead of the inning ending, Leia MermejoVarga walked with two outs to lead the bases, leading to Leanna Lewis’ turn.
Ulibarri threw three straight balls to put the pressure on the West Las Vegas senior, and Leanna Lewis used it to her advantage.
“I knew the next pitch, I wasn’t going to swing,” Leanna Lewis said. “Even though she threw a strike, odds were that she was going to throw another ball.”
There was no drama with the Lady Cardinals, though. Only Alcott and Mermejo-Varga had base hits against Duran and were the only baserunners for the game.
On the other side, Robertson had eight hits and took advantage of four Lady Braves errors to fashion its win. Ashlea Lujan went 3-for-4 with a pair of runs scored, while Montano went 2-for-3 with a double and three RBIs to lead the Lady Cardinals’ hitting attack.
SFIS used Ariana Marcotte as the starting pitcher to throw the Lady Cardinals’ timing off because of her slower speed.
“It took us an inning, an inning-and-a-half to adjust and catch up with her,” Quintana said. “They were pitching inside to us, and we just had to adjust.”