By Jimmy Friery
SANTA BARBARA, CA – The Santa Barbara City College Softball team beat Ventura at home on Monday, 9-2, improving their conference record to 3-0.
After outscoring their opponents 39-1 in their first 2 conference matchups, SBCC took it a little easier in this win, but still came out swinging.
After Alena Johnson pitched a 1-2-3 1st, Mia Reveles stayed hot with a leadoff single. The freshman outfielder ended the day with a blistering .564 on-base percentage. She promptly stole second and third before scoring on Jessica Reveles' single. Mackenzie Ensign's RBI groundout would tack on another run—2-0 Vaqueros at the end of the 1st.
In the bottom of the 2nd, Melissa Rodriguez doubled Anaya Sutcliffe home and ended up scoring on the play, padding the early lead to 4-0. Mia Reveles then hit her 5th homer of the year, and Gracie Verdugo's 2-out RBI single scored Jessica Reveles. The 4-run inning gave SBCC a 6-0 lead after just 2 innings.
Alena Johnson was excellent in the circle for the Vaqueros, controlling the game and allowing just 1 run in the 4th and 1 unearned run in the 5th. Her final line would end up as a complete game win—7 innings, 5 hits, 1 earned run.
Thus, it was a closer 6-2 SBCC lead heading to the bottom of the 5th before Leila Chisholm smacked a 2-RBI triple, scoring Johnson and Ensign. Chisholm would score Rodriguez's sacrifice fly later in the inning to bring the lead back to a more comfortable 9-2. That would be the rest of the scoring for the game, with Johnson, as mentioned, closing it out.
Mia Reveles ended the day with 3 hits, including the homer, and stole 3 bases. Jessica Reveles contributed 2 hits, a walk, and a stolen base, and Alexia Ayala also had a multi-hit game with 2.
The Vaqueros (3-0) have less than 24 hours off, playing next on Tuesday at Cuesta (3-0) at 2:30 PM. A big early matchup between two top-of-the-conference teams, both will put their undefeated starts to conference play to the test.
