After suffering an early-in-the-morning, early-in-the-tournament
defeat in South Lake Tahoe last weekend, the Hollister Heat 14U
fastpitch softball team rebounded with four straight victories
before finally falling to the Los Banos Tigers in the championship
final.
HOLLISTER
After suffering an early-in-the-morning, early-in-the-tournament defeat in South Lake Tahoe last weekend, the Hollister Heat 14U fastpitch softball team rebounded with four straight victories before finally falling to the Los Banos Tigers in the championship final.
The Heat, compiling a 4-2 record, finished runner-up in Lake Tahoe. Clawing its way back into title contention, Hollister allowed one unearned run against Los Banos in the championship, and lost to the undefeated Tigers by a narrow 1-0 margin.
“After our first game on Saturday, we played like I knew we could,” manager Rod Bachman said. ” We have power up and down the lineup and speed and I knew we just had to put it together and we would be the team to beat.”
Hollister’s inclusion in the championship final was a bit of a shock to some, including the tournament’s director, Bachman said, after the Heat opened pool play with a 15-0 loss to the San Anselmo Storm. The game, though, was held at 7:30 a.m.
“I knew it would be a struggle for our girls on these early games,” Bachman said. “After we finished the game, I had a talk with girls about their dedication. From that point on, we were on our ‘A’ game.”
Behind the arm of Madalyn Silva, Hollister’s second game in pool play resulted in a 12-7 win over the Quicksilver, which is based out of San Jose.
In its third and final game of pool play, Hollister matched up with the King City Hurricanes, which had previously defeated the Heat at a tournament in Carmel two weeks ago.
“I wanted our girls to show them that was a fluke,” Bachman said.
The Heat proved as much when it opened with a seven-spot in the first inning, highlighted by home runs from Celeste Munoz and Alissa Rodriguez. Jordan Bachman connected on a pair of triples as well and Hollister advanced to bracketed play as the No. 2 seed after it toppled King City by a 9-3 margin.
Opening Sunday’s play against the Pleasanton Phantom, the Heat found itself in a pitcher’s duel with Hollister’s Jordan Bachman allowing just a single unearned run in the fifth inning. Trailing by one run heading to the final frame, though, the Heat threatened when Celeste Munoz connected on an infield single and Kali Avera trailed with a perfectly placed bunt that put both runners into scoring position with no outs.
However, on back-to-back infield grounders, both Munoz and Avera were thrown out at the plate trying to score the tying run. But the Heat still had runners on second and third, only now with two outs, when Amy Deidrick stepped in for some last-minute heroics.
On a 1-2 pitch, Deidrick drove a two-run double into the left-center field gap, scoring both Bachman and Silva en route to a 2-1 victory for the Heat, which advanced to the semifinal round to play the Fremont Flyers as a result.
Although the Heat trumped the Flyers by a comfortable 9-1 margin in the semifinal round, Fremont had its chances early in the game. In the first inning, Fremont put a pair of runners into scoring position with no one out when shortstop Annie Hernandez backhanded a grounder and fired home to get a Flyer at the plate. Catcher Dana Sullivan then threw to third to get the advancing runner, and although the ball was overthrown, left fielder Celeste Munoz backed up the play and threw the advancing runner out at the plate.
Advancing to the championship final against Los Banos, in a game that turned out to be another pitcher’s duel, Hollister hurler Jordan Bachman managed to hold the Tigers scoreless until the fourth inning. However, the Heat committed an error in the fourth frame, supplying the Tigers with the game’s only run.
Later in the contest, though, Hollister did manage to put a pair of runners on after hits from Dana Sullivan and Amy Deidrick, but it couldn’t plate the tying run.
Bachman, meanwhile, allowed just two hits against Los Banos.
“This team is very special,” Rod Bachman said. “We have a lot of talent on this team, even though we are very young.”
Hollister, despite being a 14U team, had just one 14-year-old on its roster.
“I can’t wait till next year to see what this team can do,” Bachman added.
