Pacifica Makes Most of Opportunity

Hacienda Heights Wilson pitcher Jamee Juarez had allowed only three hits in her first two playoff games. And in her team’s quarterfinal game Thursday at top-seeded Garden Grove Pacifica, she didn’t allow a hit in five of the six innings she pitched.

But in that other inning ...

Jennifer Orpitelli singled with two out in the fourth inning, driving in Jessica Marical from second base to give Pacifica a 1-0 victory over Wilson in a Southern Section Division III game that featured two of the top-ranked teams in the state.

Neither Pacifica (28-2-1), ranked No. 3 in the state by Cal-Hi Sports, nor No. 14 Wilson (25-3-1) expected to face the other in a quarterfinal, but a loss in the last week of the season by Wilson to Covina Charter Oak threw the pairings askew.

“I think we do a good job of turning worry into positive energy,” said Orpitelli, a senior first baseman and Pacifica’s only left-handed batter in the lineup.

The clutch fourth-inning hit by Orpitelli was enough to move the Mariners past the team that beat them, 8-0, in the 2000 championship and set up a semifinal game on Tuesday against Riverside King, a 2-0 winner over Atascadero. A coin flip will determine the home team.

“With Juarez in the circle, you don’t know how many chances you’re going to get to score someone from second base,” Orpitelli said.

It turned out there were two chances, the other being in the second inning when Juarez (19-3) walked her only two batters. She struck out nine. Four of the six innings, Pacifica went down in order. Consecutive strikeouts helped get her out of the second-inning jam, which ended when Mallorie Lenn was caught trying to steal third base.

But Marical, who singled softly to center field to open the fourth inning, stole second base, putting her in position to score on Orpitelli’s line drive to left-center field. She slid in ahead of the throw home.

“We were convinced this was a championship game,” Juarez said. “If we could get past this game, everything else wouldn’t be as hard.”

But they couldn’t do that against Pacifica freshman Brittany Weil (23-0), who allowed five hits and stranded six baserunners. She struck out seven.

Martin Henderson

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In Division II softball:

Placentia El Dorado 2, Santa Ana Foothill 1--El Dorado’s Molly Harris scored twice, the second on a double by Heather Martin in the bottom of the 11th inning, to upset top-seeded Foothill (29-4).

La Palma Kennedy 2, Riverside Poly 1--Elaina Nordstrom singled in Breanne Sabol and Michelle Turner in the 16th inning to break a scoreless tie and give the visiting Fighting Irish (23-5-1) the victory.

Poly scored on an error with two out in the bottom of the inning to make it 2-1, but Turner (22-4-1) induced a groundout to end the game. Turner, who threw a five-hitter with 12 strikeouts, had her streak of scoreless innings ended at 121, three short of the Southern Section record of 124 set by Keira Goerl of Moreno Valley in 1999.