<\/div>\n<\/p>\n
On a sometimes-sunny Saturday afternoon, the LBCC Vikings softball team made the day perfect, winning a pair of non-conference wins to improve to 15-7 overall. <\/span>Hosting a three-way double header with Santa Ana College and Grossmont College, the Vikings picked up wins over both opposing squads, downing Santa Ana 11-2 and then taking Grossmont to extra innings later, winning 3-2.<\/p>\n The Vikings opened up the day with their big win over Santa Ana. Long Beach put the game out of reach early with an eight-run first inning. <\/span>Leading 2-0 after a two-run homerun by first baseman Monique Ogata, the Vikings took advantage of a crucial two-out error and went on to score six unearned runs off Santa Ana starter Katlyn Harp. <\/span>Right fielder Dora Hogue added a two-run double and third baseman Valentina Nabayan plated two runs with a single in her second at bat of the first inning.<\/p>\n Nabayan added a RBI single in the bottom of the second and in the third, Ogata smashed a run-scoring double and designated player Vanessa Samudio brought in a run with her grounder to close out the Vikings’ scoring.<\/p>\n Freshman Kaci Keltner earned the win for Long Beach to improve to 3-2. She went the distance and allowed two unearned runs and four hits over five innings. <\/span>Nabayan (2 for 3, 1 run, 2 RBI), Ogata (2 for 3, 2 run, 3 RBI, HR, 2B), and Hogue (2 for 3, 1 run, 3 RBI, 2B) all had two hits for Long Beach.<\/p>\n The Vikings closed the afternoon with a well-deserved extra-inning win against Grossmont in what could be a possible playoff matchup later in the season. <\/span>The pitcher’s duel between LBCC’s Christine Garcia and Grossmont’s Charnel Zetsch remained scoreless after seven innings.<\/p>\n Because of the international tie-breaker rule, Grossmont began the top of the eighth with a runner on second base. After a sacrifice bunt moved pinch runner Amber Beebe to third, Beebe was able to score on a fielding error by LBCC shortstop Rose Vargas on Heather Brewer’s grounder.<\/p>\n Long Beach came back to even the score with a run in the bottom of the eighth. Freshman Jean Gallegos was placed on second base to start the inning. She was moved to third base on a one-out single by designated player Alyssa Aguirre. Ogata’s groundout to second base brought home Gallegos to send the game to the ninth.<\/p>\n Then Grossmont took the lead once again. Alyc Kalahama started the top of the ninth on second. She moved to third on a groundout and then came in to score on a sacrifice fly by Katie Thomas to give Grossmont the 2-1 advantage.<\/p>\n But the Vikings would finally end the game in the bottom of the ninth. Pinch runner Renae Ramirez began at second and promptly came in to score on a double by Samudio. With one out and the score tied 2-2, catcher Alyssa Belmontes’ bunt single moved Samudio and the go-ahead run to third. Vargas made up for her error by lining a 3-2 pitch down the right-field line to bring in Samudio for the game winner.<\/p>\n Gonzalez picked up the win to improve to 12-5 this season. She allowed two unearned runs and just three hits over nine innings while striking out six. Aguirre led the Vikings at the plate going 2 for 4.<\/p>\n Zetsch earned the loss for Grossmont (18-4 overall). She gave up three runs (one earned) and seven hits over 8 1\/3 innings. <\/span>Long Beach returns to South Coast Conference action on Tuesday (Mar 17) when it hosts Mt. San Antonio College at 3pm.<\/p>\n From report by LBCC’s Chris Ruiz<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Vikings stayed hot with another two wins, improving to 15-7.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-4425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4425"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4425\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4425"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=4425"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=4425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}