BC faces tall order in Super Regional
The Bakersfield College softball season has come full circle.
The Renegades opened their year at home against Mt. San Antonio College. BC pitcher Talia Nielsen struck out 18 in nine innings while allowing just two earned runs, but the Mounties’ Brianna Goris went 4-for-4 with a double and a triple, and Mireya Amezcua drove in the go-ahead run to give Mt. SAC a 3-2 win in extras.
More than three months later, Nielsen is the Western State Conference Pitcher of the Year, Goris is the South Coast Conference Player of the Year and BC (36-7) and Mt. SAC (39-3) will reunite for a second-round best-of-three playoff series beginning tonight in Walnut.
The winner will emerge from the California Community College Athletic Association Super Regional and earn a berth in the state championships, which begin Thursday at BC.
The Renegades will need to buck a trend, as they enter as the No. 8 seed facing top-seeded Mt. SAC, and the higher seed has won all 10 SoCal playoff series so far, with an overall record of 18-3.
One of those losses was suffered by BC, which dropped its opening matchup in the previous round against El Camino 6-5 on a Kayla Inzunza seventh-inning RBI double. Nielsen allowed four earned runs, equaling her season high, in the Renegades’ first home loss since Jan. 29.
But they came back the following day and eked out a 2-1 win on a Shelby Buchanan home run, then piled on the offense in a 9-1 run-rule victory in which Nielsen, Kady Smith and Shelbie Valencia drove in two runs each. In all, Nielsen pitched 16 2/3 innings for the weekend, after tossing two complete games and spelling Smith in Game 2.
The Mounties split their work in the circle between the dominant sophomore duo of Grace Pieson and Serena Navarrete, who boast ERAs of 1.09 and 0.84, respectively. Navarrete allowed two earned runs in four innings when she met the Renegades in January, which is still tied for her most all season, but she finished with a no-decision after Pieson gave up just one hit in five innings for the win.
Pieson was uneven as Mt. SAC took on 16-seed Moorpark in Game 1 of the first playoff round,