For a few hours Sunday, the West Valley looked every bit like the north's #4 seed. The Vikings had just dominated #13 Sierra 8-3 to even the 3C2A NorCal best-of-three series at 1-1 and set up a deciding game three at Viking Field.
Game three didn't go as planned for West Valley (30-10) as the Wolverines (18-23) took game three 3-1 to advance to the NorCal Super Regional May 10-11 at San Jose City College (30-9).
The Vikings dropped a lackluster 7-4 game one Friday, but after getting rained out Saturday, stormed back Sunday. The compiled a 6-0 lead through three innings with three runs in the first, two in the second and another in the third.
Andrea DeJesus led off the game (the Vikings were the designated visitors by virtue of a coin flip for both Sunday games) with a single, stole 2nd, advanced to 3rd and came home when Brianna Chambers Lee reached on an E6. Larissa Higgins singled down the first base line to knock in Chambers Lee. Higgins made it 3-0 when she scored on a Kayla Gonzalez ground out to 2nd.
WVC added two more runs in the top of the 2nd on back-to-back triples from Gabriella Diotalevi and Alina Perez. Perez drove home Diotalevi with a shot to the fence in left-center and then scampered home on a DeJesus sacrifice fly to center.
The Vikings added another run in the 3rd and then gave up a three-run homer to Kayleigh Lugowski in the bottom of the fifth to help the Wolverines claw to within 6-3. West Valley put another pair of important runs on the board in the top of the 7th. Higgins smashed a double to center that brought home DeJesus and Keithleen Gonzalez and gave WVC an insurmountable 8-3 lead.
Reliever Samantha Mader struck out Whitney Montoya and Lugowski to end the game and send the series to game three.
Higgins led the offense with a 2-for-3, three-RBI outing, while DeJesus finished 2-for-3 with an RBI and two runs scored. Starter Miranda Torres picked up the win in the circle.
West Valley grabbed a 1-0 lead in game three, but Sierra answered with three of their own in the bottom of the inning.
Viking Field is the home of the 2024 3C2A Softball Championships May 16-19. For more information, visit "Tournament Central":
https://www.cccaasports.org/sports/sball/Championships