Fossatti Leads Foothill to the Finals

It may have taken six innings to score, but host Foothill eventually advanced to the Southern Section Division I softball finals with a 3-0 victory Tuesday over Etiwanda.

Foothill pitcher Courtney Fossatti and her counterpart Ashley Carroll kept the game scoreless until the bottom of the sixth inning, when Foothill finally broke through.

Amber Dragomir led off the inning with a single and advanced to second when Caitlin Lowe followed with another single. Autumn Champion’s sacrifice bunt put runners at second and third.

Fossatti then helped her cause with a squeeze bunt to score Dragomir and give the Knights a 1-0 advantage.

“It was one of those situations where I knew what was coming and I knew what I needed to do for us to get a run,” Fossatti said.

Kristen Mann then doubled to left field to score Lowe and Tiffany Haas followed with a single to score Mann and make the score 3-0.

The Knights will face Mater Dei, a 1-0 winner over Camarillo, in the final. That matchup could feature two of the county’s top two pitchers: Fossatti (23-1) and Mater Dei’s Tia Bollinger (30-1), who pitched a perfect game Tuesday against Camarillo.

Foothill had several opportunities to score earlier in the game.

“We had a couple of opportunities with runners in scoring positions where we just hit the ball at people,” Foothill Coach Joe Gonzalez said. “But the girls kept going and we were able to get it done.”

Fossatti pitched a two-hitter, allowing a single in the first and a single in the seventh to go with six strikeouts.