Simi Valley at a Loss Before 4-0 Defeat

It should have been the show of shows between two of the area’s top softball teams.

The Marmonte League’s grand opening.

A pitcher’s duel in the sun, starring Nicole Angelo of Thousand Oaks High and Mandy Kilionski of Simi Valley.

Instead . . . thud. Bring down the curtain.

Kilionski dropped a bombshell Thursday morning on Coach Suzanne Manlet and the Pioneers.

“She quit,” Manlet said after watching Thousand Oaks deal Simi Valley a 4-0 loss in a league opener. “She said she wasn’t having fun anymore.”

Simi Valley’s loss was the Lancers’ gain.

Although Thousand Oaks prepared for the riseball-throwing Kilionski all week, the Lancers had no trouble adjusting to her stand-in, junior right-hander Elizabeth Smith.

Thousand Oaks (6-1), ranked No. 3 in the region by The Times, rapped out five consecutive singles and scored three runs before No. 4 Simi Valley (3-2-1) recorded an out in the first inning.

“We had the best three practices of the year getting ready for this game,” Thousand Oaks Coach Gary Walin said.

“We worked really hard on staying off [Kilionski’s riseball]. And then this happens.”

Kilionski, a right-hander, burst on to the scene midseason last year as a freshman. She finished 8-3 with a 0.30 earned-run average, 117 strikeouts and only eight walks in 93 innings.

“We practiced hard on the pitches we were expecting from [Kilionski],” said Lancer catcher Jenni Perez, who had run-scoring singles in the first and sixth innings. “But I think we adjusted really well.”

Sheridan Fowler and Andi Keesling started the hitting binge with consecutive bunts. After a double steal, Michelle Spencer, Chelsea Berthiaume and Perez followed with a run-scoring singles.

But the Lancers cooled considerably after the first-inning fireworks, collecting only three hits in the next five innings.

“I was real happy with the first inning,” Walin said. “But after that . . . at least we came back with another run in the sixth.”

Spencer, who had two hits, reached base on an error to leadoff the sixth and stole second.

After a ground out by Berthiaume, Perez followed with a looping single to right field and Spencer scored.

Although the Lancers played error-free softball, they were not sharp on the basepaths.

Thousand Oaks, which lost to Hart, 5-0, in the championship game of the Hart tournament Saturday, ran itself into double plays and out of scoring opportunities in the first and third innings.

Angelo (3-1) scattered singles in the second, third and seventh, struck out two and hit a batter.

Only one of Simi Valley’s four baserunners advanced past first base. Christina Haddad, who had two hits, took second on a grounder with two out in the seventh inning.