Foothill Wins Title, Should Get a Top Spot

During the hourlong wait for an umpiring crew to show up for Thursday’s showdown between the Century League’s two best softball teams, Canyon Coach Lance Eddy offered to flip a coin to decide the outcome because “this game doesn’t really mean anything.”

Joe Gonzalez, Foothill’s coach, declined--for good reason.

Foothill got three hits in three innings off Canyon pitcher Veronica Lopez, blistered four of its eight hits for extra bases in a 5-0 victory that put the finishing touches on its seventh consecutive league title.

“We hit well, we played good defense, we got good pitching,” Gonzalez said. “It meant plenty.”

It was a perfect way to go into next week’s Southern Section playoffs, though Eddy downplayed the game’s importance because both teams already had secured playoff berths.

However, the victory by host Foothill (25-2-1, 10-0 in league) virtually ensures it goes into the Division I playoffs as the top-seeded team and plays its first three games in Orange County. Second-place Canyon (18-12-1, 8-2), which might have been one of the four seeded teams in Division III, might not be so lucky now.

It was a hard pill to swallow for Canyon, which lost last time, 3-2, in nine innings when Jaime Clark doubled and scored on two passed balls. This time there wasn’t nearly as much drama.

Foothill scored two earned runs off Lopez (14-5, 0.44 earned-run average), who had allowed only six earned runs in 123 1/3 innings. Lopez left after a 33-pitch third inning.

Lopez apparently was hurt when Lauren Bauer, who had singled and taken third base on Clark’s single, scored on a wild pitch. Eddy said Lopez skinned her hand and hurt her leg as Bauer slid into her and avoided the tag for the first of her three runs.

“When [Lopez] threw from then on, we could tell she wasn’t pitching the same,” Eddy said.

Jenny Beltran’s single made it 2-0. Foothill added two more runs with two out in the fourth inning off reliever Jennifer Hunt. Amber Dragomir singled, Bauer walked and Rosie Gustavson’s opposite-field triple down the left-field line drove in both runners.

Bauer tripled in the sixth and later scored on an error. Foothill threatened with runners reaching second base every inning.

Sophomore Lauren Schwendimann (10-1, 0.44) made her first league start and limited Canyon to four hits; she walked one and struck out nine. Schwendimann pitched 7 2/3 innings of two-hit relief in the first meeting, giving up one run and striking out 13.

Thursday was only the second time Canyon had been shut out this season. No one reached third base--thanks to Bauer’s assist when pinch-runner Marie Coleman tried to advance on Becky Tippets’ sixth-inning single.

In other Century League games:

Villa Park 3, El Modena 1--Jennifer Sturgeon had a two-out single, driving in Audra Gussin with the go-ahead run and Dora Arenas scored on an error in a two-run sixth inning for Villa Park (14-11, 6-4). Allyson Hannigan (3-1) won her third consecutive game as the Spartans clinched third place.