Royal girls blast River View to stay in softball race

ROYAL CITY - The Royal Knights blasted River View, 14-4, last week to stay in the race for the SCAC district high school softball tournament.

The victory salvaged a week in which the Knights dropped two well-played games and one rout. Instead of 2-6, they came out of the week at 3-5.

Twin losses to Connell included a 5-1 game in which Seila Jenks held the hard-hitting Eagles to seven hits. McDarra von Stein led the batters with two hits in three at-bats.

Game 2 with Connell was the rout, 12-2. But not for Sam Eilers. She battled the Eagles with three hits, one run batted in and one run scored.

"We were not able to capitalize when we had runners on base," coach Robyn Valdez said. "That issue, coupled with one or two rough defensive innings, took us out of this contest."

The girls were still reeling from the loss when River View showed up Saturday. They came out flat and started on defense with a couple of errors that allowed runs in the first inning en route to a hard-to-take 5-2 loss.

"Our girls didn't put even one run on the board until the fifth inning, when the bats finally started coming alive. But it was too little too late," Valdez said.

Again the Knights struggled with runners on base. Ali Rodriguez batted 2-3, Carmen Rodriguez had a double, and von Stein, Jenks and Kayla Smith all had triples. Royal outhit the Panthers, 7-6.

The pitching was solid once again. Jenks struck out nine batters and walked only one.

The loss left the Knights with a 2-5 mark and the prospect of falling way back in the race in the second game. Then things turned. The Royal girls hit the ball all over the park for the 14-4 win.

"Every time I walked over to coach first base, the umpire asked me what I fed/said/did to the girls between games because they didn't look like the same team," Valdez said.

Indeed they were not. They exploded for 21 hits in six innings. Jenks batted 4-5, von Stein and Araujo went 3-4, and von Stein had five RBI. VonStein, Ali Rodriguez, and Kailee Harris all had doubles, von Stein had a triple, Eilers had two sacrifice bunts and Flor Araujo had 3 stolen bases.

Jenks hit a lead-off first pitch single to get things started. It was followed by a bunt by Eilers and a double by von Stein. The Knights scored three runs in the first, six in the second and four in the third, holding the panthers scoreless until the top of the fifth.

Royal scored one run in the sixth to end the game.

In action a week earlier, a tough Warden team turned the Knights away, 7-3 and 11-0 to start the SCAC season. But the Knights won two from Burbank.

Jenks had nine strikeouts and only three walks from the mound in the first Warden game. Eilers went 2-4 and Carmen Rodriguez went 1-2, both scoring runs. Eilers, Flor Araujo and Harris had one RBI each. Smith and Eilers went 1-2 in the second game.

"Warden has a great pitcher, and she throws harder than what we had seen previously this season," Valdez said. "Our batters were caught off guard and had a hard time catching up.

"This was a huge eye opener for us heading into the most important part of our season. The girls worked hard all week to improve in areas that we saw weakness during those two games. Each girl made huge strides and we came back strong against Burbank."

The Coyotes went down 10-3 and 8-6. Jenks was 2-2 and von Stein 2-3, and Harris had 4 RBI in the first game. Jenks had six strikeouts and no walks from the mound.

In game 2, Jenks, Eilers and Harris batted 2-4. Von Stein had an inside-the-park home run.

"Burbank actually scored first in both of these games, but it was obvious that our work during the week really payed off," Valdez said. "The girls made lots of tough plays."

Bianca Castellon, a freshman catcher, showed exceptional improvement, catching two balls behind the plate that had been popped up for crucial outs. She had struggled with popups.