Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Lady Tigers win three of four games at tourney

Manzano will be the opponent in LLHS's District 5-5A opener

Jason W. Brooks News-Bulletin Staff Writer; jbrooks@news-bulletin.com

Rio Rancho It could be said that at the Kristin Griego Memorial Softball Tournament in Rio Rancho last weekend Los Lunas Lady Tigers beat up on three teams with poor defense and got only one hit against a Class 4A opponent. That's probably not how optimistic Tiger fans think of the tournament.

They probably think of their team as being 8-5 afterward and starting to gain momentum as District 5-5A play nears. With a second starting pitcher getting some work, the Tiger bats afire and the defense seeing what it needs to work on, it's easy to be an optimistic Tiger fan right now.

"Baserunning and defense need some work, but we have experience," said LLHS coach Paul Cieremans. "Now we just need to keep playing like we have experience."

The Tigers were set to travel to Cibola to take on the defending 5A champion Lady Cougars after News-Bulletin press time. That's their final tune-up for District 5-5A play, which begins Thursday, April 3, when the Tigers travel to Manzano.

Los Lunas won its tourney opener 12-1 over 5A Gallup early Friday, then fell 4-0 to 4A powerhouse Farmington later in the day. The Class 5A Tigers then bounced back from that loss to open Saturday's play with a 13-3 thumping of the only 3A team in the tourney, Robertson, and claimed fifth place at the event by beating 5A Gadsden 9-1 several hours later.

All three of the Tigers' wins were by mercy rule against teams that made at least three errors apiece; the Gadsden game only went five innings per tournament rules.

Gabby Pino and Heather Kline were named all-tournament, and many of their hits came early in the count. Kline had a home run against Gallup and an RBI double in the Gadsden game. Pino, the leadoff hitter, set the tone by getting on base in both of Saturday's games, racking up three hits in each contest.

The Tigers made eight errors in the four games, and while Cieremans offered no excuses, he admitted the high winds at the tourney were an issue there. Adri Gabaldon pitched the Farmington and Gadsden games to improve to 6-5, while sophomore Angelica Trujillo (2-0) made her first two varsity appearances in facing Gallup and Robertson.

"Adri is still our No. 1, but if we can use Angelica to eat up some innings, we will," said Cieremans.

The Farmington game was closer than the score might indicate, as the Scorpions (10-2 by the tourney's end) never had a multi-run inning against LLHS. Robin Randall hit a solo homer off Gabaldon to lead off the fourth, and the Tigers only managed two baserunners against FHS, which went on to beat host Rio Rancho in the final.

The Tigers managed only one hit and struck out 13 times against Scorpion pitcher Alyssa Rahm in the loss.

An important bright spot in the tourney for the Tigers was the continued improvement of freshman left fielder Jackie Candelaria, who scored twice against Gallup, reached first base after a dropped third strike against Farmington, had two RBI and scored three times against Robertson, and bunted for a base hit against Gadsden.

Devonne Martinez was one of several other Tigers who also hit well at the tournament. Martinez had five RBI in Saturday's action alone.

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