By Imani Johnson
Staff Writer
While a 4-9 record may not seem like the most blazing of starts, considering the CSUDH softball’s team misfortunes last year, in which it won only eight games all season, it’s definitely a move forward.
Through last weekend’s games, the Lady Toros are 4-9 overall and 2-6 in California Collegiate Athletic Association play. They began the season winning two of five games in the Desert Stinger tournament in Las Vegas, and then returned home to begin conference play by taking two games from fifth-ranked Humboldt State University. But they dropped the next two against the Lumberjacks and were then swept in a four-game series at Sonoma State University.
“We’ve done some good things in the first few weeks of our season, but we know we have a lot of room to improve,” softball coach Kim Aggabao said. “And we’re excited about that.”
Aggabao praised her upperclassmen for showing “good leadership,” pitchers Alyssa Valinches and Alyssa Olague for some quality starts that “have put us in positions to be successful,” and an offense that has “shown it is very capable of scoring runs.”
The Toros couldn’t have started conference action better. In the first game of a Feb. 9 doubleheader, senior pitcher Valinches struck out 11 in a complete game shutout. The Toros won 5-0 and, combined with their 9-6 win in the second game, in which freshman pitcher Olague tossed a complete game, they outscored the Lumberjacks 14-6.
The Toros lost both games of a doubleheader the next day, 4-2, and 13-9.
The offense played well against Humboldt State, but could muster only five runs in four games against Sonoma State. The first two games were tight, as a two-run triple in the bottom of the fifth inning by Karly Macadangdang turned a 3-2 contest into an eventual 6-2 loss. In the next game, Olague had a shutout heading into the bottom sixth, but another triple by Macadangdang helped turn a 1-0 Toro lead into a 3-2 defeat.
CSUDH was flattened, 7-0, in the third game and lost another close one in the fourth game. After Chloe Wenger’s two-run single in the fourth scored Rachael Sandoval and Damari Simon to give the Toros a 2-0 lead, Sonoma State scored two in the bottom of the fourth and plated another in the bottom of the sixth.
Offensively, the team has been led by Wenger, who is batting .375, Jazmin Guzman, batting .372 with a team-high 16 hits, Kendelle Messersmith, who is slugging .474, and Sandoval, who leads in RBIs (10) and slugging (.500) and is tied with Renee Galindo with two home runs.
On the mound, the Toros two starting pitchers, Valinches and Olague, have tossed seven complete games in their combined 13 starts, and each has a shutout. Valinches has also fanned 30 batters in her 35/2 innings, and Olague has hurled a team-high 38 innings pitched.
“We are just working to be more consistent, and I am extremely confident we will be able to do that,” Aggabao said. “Our focus is trying to be 1-0, no matter what happened the previous game. You always hear it: ‘one game at a time.’ But we’re trying to live it. Obviously it is a little easier to go into the next game after a win, but we have the toughness and focus to compete no matter what.”
The Toros return home this weekend, hosting Cal State San Bernardino (8-5 overall, 3-5 in CCAA play) for four games Friday and Saturday. On March 2-3, they will travel to Cal State East Bay (8-6, 4-4) for four games.
