The Long Beach City College softball team suffered a 3-2 eight-inning loss to visiting Los Angeles Mission College on Saturday in their best-of-three first-round Southern California Regional Playoffs series at LBCC.
The loss dropped No. 6-seeded Long Beach to 31-13 overall while No. 11 seed Mission improved to 30-9. The Vikings will need to win a pair of games on Sunday to advance to next weekend’s Super Regional.
On Saturday, Mission took advantage of three late LBCC miscues to pull out the extra-inning win.
Mission jumped on the Vikings first, scoring a pair of runs in the top of the third inning. Rosheema Wise walked and Amanda Gutierrez bunted safely to put a pair of runners on with no outs. Stephanie Boshae followed that with a single to center to drive in both runs and put the Eagles up 2-0.
Long Beach got a run back in the bottom of the fourth. Catcher Alyssa Belmontes led off with a walk and promptly came in to score in on a double by state co-player of the year Vanessa Samudio.
The Vikings rallied to tie up the ball game in the sixth. Samudio got things going with a two-out single and came in to score on a double by all-state third baseman Valentina Nabayan.
LBCC looked to take the lead after loading up the bases with two outs, but second baseman Alyssa Aguirre fouled out to left field to end the threat.
Mistakes hurt Long Beach in the deciding eighth inning. Boshae led off the inning grounding to second, but first baseman Dora Hogue couldn’t hold on to the throw allowing Boshae to reach base.
Julienne Jimenez followed that with a grounder to the hole deep at short. Shortstop Rose Vargas’ throw sailed high, allowing Boashae to advance to third. Evie Lugo then hit a high fly ball to shallow left-center field. Samudio and center fielder Karina Martinez collided on the play, which allowed Boshae to come in for the game-winner.
Sophomore Christine Gonzalez earned the loss for Long Beach to fall to 24-10 overall. She allowed three runs (two earned) and nine hits, and struck out seven in the complete-game effort.
Samudio led LBCC at the plate, going 3 for 4 with two doubles, a run, and a RBI.
Allyson Salas (22-9) picked up the win for Mission. She struck out eight and allowed two runs and five hits while going the distance. Gutierrez was 3 for 4 with a run to lead the Eagles’ offense.
Game 2 is set for 12 p.m. on Sunday at LBCC. Game 3 if necessary would immediately follow.
Report by LBCC’s Chris Ruiz