Huskie softball staves off elimination; on to state
Rodney Harwood/Hagadone Newspaper Group - Dominique Martinez, center, celebrates with coaches and teammates after hitting a walk-off double to win Saturday's CWAC/GNL crossover game against West Valley from Spokane.
Rodney Harwood/Hagadone Newspaper Group - Othello senior Mariah Deleon reacts after scoring the winning run in Saturday's CWAC/GNL crossover game at Othello. The Huskies came back with three runs in the bottom of the seventh inning to beat West Valley 7-6 to advance to the state tournament.
OTHELLO — Othello senior Dominique Martinez had a chance to slam the door in the top of the seventh inning of Saturday’s CWAC/GNL crosser game with West Valley, but two uncharacteristic errors and a timely hit suddenly put the 2A defending champions behind the eightball when the Eagles regained the lead.
Martinez, who’s headed to the University of Hawaii on a scholarship, did get it done with her bat, driving a waste-high fastball into the gap for a walk-off double to help the Huskies avoid elimination and advance to the 2A state tournament with a 7-6 victory.
“It was all or nothing. This was going to be my last (high school) at-bat. It was probably my best at-bat and the one I’ll always remember,” Martinez said. “She just tubed it. It might have been a little inside, but it was right down the middle and I hit it right back up the middle.”
Martinez drove it into the right-center power alley, driving in Cayleen Garza and Mariah Deleon and the Huskies erased a 6-4 deficit in dramatic fashion with a three-run seventh inning.
“We’ve been telling ourselves all season, it’s not how you start, but how you finish,” Deleon said. “I told Dominique she hits it out of the infield I was going to score.”
The Eagles, who won six of their last seven games of the Great North League regular season, had the defending champs on the ropes a couple of times. They took a 2-0 lead into the fifth. Othello never lost its composure, taking its first lead with a three-run fifth, which included an RBI single by Deleon. Martinez made it a two-run cushion in the sixth when she scored on a throwing error.
“That’s the thing about this team, we never give up,” said head coach Rudy Ochoa. “We just keep looking to make something happen.”
Both teams were playing for their playoff lives. Othello quickly got the first two outs in the top half of the seventh, but Sarah Nowels singled to keep it alive. Then came the defining moment; with freshman Jillian Taylor, a left-handed, slapper, and Martinez, a Division I caliber pitcher, locked into an epic battle.
Martinez quickly established a two-strike count, but Taylor fouled off three consecutive balls and eventually worked a 10-pitch at-bat into a base on balls.
“She just kept getting a piece of it whether it was right on the plate or a ball inside or a ball out, she kept hitting it,” Martinez said. “It’s hard, especially when the game is that close. But I kept thinking, next pitch, next pitch.”
A Huskies throwing error led to a run and a misplayed ball in the outfield allowed three to score and the Eagles staved off elimination to take a two-run lead.
“We were in a good spot in the order with our nine then one-two-three-four,” Ocha said of the bottom half of the seventh. “We had moved Nikki (Velazquez) from No. 2 down to ninth in the order and it worked out perfectly.”
With East Valley and Cheney getting rained out on Saturday, state tournament brackets are still incomplete. The only thing Othello knows for sure is that the team will have a chance to defend its title Friday and Saturday at Carlon Park in Selah.