Prep softball: San Rafael rides pitching, defense into section final
Everything is clicking for the San Rafael High softball team just in time for the North Coast Section Division III championship.
The top-seeded Bulldogs earned their third straight shutout victory with a 4-0 blanking of No. 13 Kennedy of Fremont in Tuesday’s semifinal.
Right-handed junior Thomara Drummer has given up just two hits in three games, both coming during Tuesday’s semifinal. She added 16 more strikeouts to her stats, bringing her NCS three-game total to 41, and has not issued a walk.
The Bulldogs have supported their ace by outscoring their NCS opponents 23-0 and have only committed one error.
“I’m really happy with how we’ve been doing,” said San Rafael senior catcher Angel Amesa, who went 2 for 3 with two RBIs. “We have definitely been practicing more fundamentals to get us further in NCS. We’re all applying it and we’re really excited.”
The Bulldogs (23-3) will face the winner of Wednesday’s semifinal between No. 2 Encinal and No. 3 Cardinal Newman. The NCS championship game is set for Friday at 4:30 p.m. at San Marin High.
The Bulldogs’ much-improved defense was tested several times by the Titans (10-10), including in the fifth inning when Kennedy’s Savannah De La Mater put down a bunt that was handled by third baseman Gabby Rodriguez, who threw a strike to an outstretched Cassidy Kaplan at first.
San Rafael coach Thomas Drummer says the Bulldogs expect to see bunts since his daughter is so hard to hit.
“We’ve been practicing bunt defense every single day,” said coach Drummer. “People come in, they can’t hit T [Thomara] that well and have to go for the bunt. They’ve made every single play since we’ve implemented some new strategy.”
Conversely, the Bulldogs are very comfortable bunting, especially at the bottom of their batting order.
“We have a bunch of girls who can bunt very, very well and their hitting is off,” said coach Drummer. “We’ve got to take advantage of that and put some pressure on the defense.”
San Rafael took a 4-0 lead in the third inning as the result of a pair of Kennedy errors, a wild pitch and a perfect squeeze bunt. With runners at second and third, Larissa Baltazar dropped a spinning bunt five feet in front of the plate to score the onrushing Lila Kim.
Sophia Everett, who went 2 for 4 with two runs scored, led off the first with a single to center. She stole second and took third on a wild pitch before scoring on Amesa’s one-out single. The Bulldogs added two more runs in the second when Drummer hit into a fielder’s choice to score Luca Fondnazio. Amesa ripped a double to the fencing in center field to plate Everett.
Both Everett and Drummer were freshmen when the Bulldogs won the 2022 NCS title. After being eliminated in the NCS first round last year and getting upset in the MCAL semifinals this season, the Bulldogs are well prepared mentally for this year’s final, according to Everett.
“At the beginning of the season, it was a little bit rough,” said Everett. “We averaged like four errors a game. We’ve been getting a lot better. Our mental game has changed. I’ve been getting on them — I’m like ‘You guys can do this. You’ve just got to believe in yourselves.’ That’s been getting through to them and they’ve been working their butts off.”