El Modena defeats Glendora, 12-4, for Division II title

Orange El Modena started and ended with a bang, and when the Vanguards were done, they had a Southern Section-Toyota championship and a share of a section record.

El Modena scored five runs in the first inning, added three more in the seventh, and finished with a 12-4 victory Friday over Glendora to win the Division II softball title.

The game at Barber Park in Irvine lasted almost three hours and featured 21 hits, seven errors and 19 runners left on base.

El Modena (25-8-2) tied the scoring record set by Santa Maria St. Joseph in its 12-2 victory over Ontario Christian in the 1982 Division 1-A title game.

The record for total runs in a championship game is 20, which might have been challenged if Glendora (20-10) could have mustered a big hit. It couldn’t. It loaded the bases in the first and third innings but stranded 11 runners in all.

It’s the first title in three appearances for El Modena, which lost in 2001 and 2002. It was the first championship game appearance for Glendora, which upset second-seeded Etiwanda in the second round and was a heavy underdog after successive victories over Vista Murrieta and Garden Grove Pacifica. The Tartans committed five errors Friday night.

The offensive carnage could have been much worse.

El Modena stranded eight runners, had another thrown out at home, and another picked off trying to steal third with a 7-0 lead.

“I never felt, until the end, the game was in the bag,” said El Modena Coach Steve Harrington, whose team beat top-seeded La Palma Kennedy with an eighth-inning walk-off home run in a Tuesday semifinal. “They’re scrappy, and I’m very fortunate to have a team that has a lot of fight in it.”

El Modena put it in the bag in the seventh when it scored thee runs, two on Kylie Wagner’s single off the first baseman, another on Emily McEwen’s fourth hit.

Wagner (20-3), the winning pitcher, had four RBIs including her two-run homer in the first inning. McEwen, who followed Wagner’s line-drive home run to right field with a towering shot to left field, was four for five with three RBIs.

El Modena ended the season winning 10 of its last 11. The only blip was a tie with Valencia, the Division I finalist that plays Simi Valley for the title at 6 p.m. Saturday.

Glendora should have better days ahead. Its key players are underclassmen, and it started only three seniors in the championship, one more than its usual lineup.

Whittier La Serna 5, Menifee Paloma Valley 1 – As pitcher-catcher combinations go, it would be tough to top the performance of La Serna’s duo at Barber Park.

Holly Consterdine scattered six hits and her catcher, Ashley Holmes, hit a two-run home run to lift the Lancers to their third championship, a 5-1 victory in the Division III final at Barber Park.

Consterdine (16-3), who pitched a four-hitter in the semifinals against unbeaten and top-seeded Crescenta Valley, was in control throughout and, with five runs, enjoyed a wealth of riches.

Paloma Valley (23-9) finally broke through with a run in the top of the seventh inning. By that time the outcome appeared academic.

“It took a lot of pressure off me,” Consterdine said of the quick two-run lead courtesy Holmes’ two-out, first-inning blast to left field.

Consterdine, the No. 3 batter, blooped a single inside the right-field line. Then Holmes hit a home run well beyond the left-field fence.

“I wasn’t real happy, I’m not going to lie,” said losing pitcher A.J. Woodward (17-4), who will attend Midland College, a junior college in Midland, Texas, in the fall. “It was a rise ball. But if you don’t score more than two runs, you don’t deserve to win.”

La Serna struck again in the fifth inning on a walk and single, and with two outs, Consterdine’s second blooper to the same spot down the right-field line that drove in one run. Brooke Putich, who had singled, scored during a rundown on an error by the third baseman. Holmes lined a single off the third baseman for her second hit, third RBI and the final run.

It wasn’t until then that Consterdine and Holmes said they felt comfortable.

Consterdine, who signed with Long Beach State but will likely attend a junior college in the fall, struck out 10 and didn’t walk a batter.

“Holly was on her game today,” said Holmes, a sophomore batting .439. “Her screwball and changeup were working … every pitch I called. Today was definitely her best day. She’s a good pitcher normally, but today she was absolutely perfect.”

Woodward actually gave up fewer hits, six, walked one and struck out four.

“I have nine seniors, and half of them have been four-year varsity players,” said Ginger Larsin, who coached La Serna to championships in 1996 and 2001. “I’m really close to this group. They’ve been to the semis twice, the quarterfinals and the finals.”

Paloma Valley, in its first title game, may have been the most unlikely finalist of the playoffs. The program had never advanced beyond the first round.

The Sunbelt League champion won its first-round game, 2-1, in 12 innings on a two-out two-run error against Bloomington. It beat Laguna Hills in the quarterfinals, 2-1, when umpires reversed their decision on a game-tying fly ball in the sixth inning.

“No one at Paloma had ever made it past the first round,” Woodward said. “For us to get this far is phenomenal.”

Riverside Christian 2, Calvary Murrieta 1 – A near perfect season had a perfect ending Friday for top-seeded Riverside Christian, which scored twice in the first inning and rode the pitching of Asia Alvarez (16-0), who retired the first 10 batters and got solid defense behind her in the Division VI final at Barber Park.

She finished with a four-hitter, struck out six and walked two. The only base-runners she allowed were after two outs were made in the inning.

“I was on top of my game,” said Alvarez, a sophomore. “I spent all day telling people I was going to throw up. I’ve never felt so nervous. This game meant everything to me.”

Said Coach Art Lilly: “Asia hit almost every spot I asked her to.”

The game matched the first- and second-place teams from the Big Sky League. It was the third time Riverside Christian (26-1) beat second-seeded Calvary Murrieta (23-9-1) this season.

Calvary Murrietal was in the finals for the third year in a row. It beat Riverside Christian last year, 1-0, behind Tory Ferreira’s one-hitter. Ferreira (23-9), a Cal Baptist recruit, was the losing pitcher on Friday after allowing five hits. She hit two batters, and her team committed three errors. She finished her career with 94 victories, tied for fifth in state history.

Alvarez got all the run support she needed in the first inning as, according to the losing coach, Oscar Sanchez, the Cougars took advantage of Calvary Murrieta’s big-game jitters. An error, a hit batter and Sterling Hoham’s double to left-center field accounted for the first run. A botched squeeze with a failed pickoff attempt allowed Amanda Clark to score the second run.

“I just wanted to hit the ball hard,” said Hoham, a shortstop who transferred from Temecula Chaparral and signed with Long Island University.

It’s the second section title for Riverside Christian, which also won in 2003.

Calvary Murrieta, in its third consecutive championship game, scored in the fifth inning on three consecutive singles, the last by leadoff batter Anita Green, scoring Danielle Hatt. Alvarez got out of the inning by inducing a ground ball to second base.

 martin.henderson@latimes.com