On Thursday in their South Coast Conference game against visiting El Camino College, the Cerritos College softball team scored five times in the fourth inning to take a 5-2 lead. However, the Warriors (30-5, 19-2) scored the final seven runs of the game and handed the Falcons (27-9, 16-6) a 9-5 loss. Cerritos will now play a make-up game against Orange Coast College on Saturday at 12:00 p.m. at Nancy Kelly Field.

In the five-run fourth inning, sophomore outfielder Morgan Fontela (Long Beach Millikan HS) led off with a single and advanced to second base when sophomore designated player Briana Zarate (Legacy HS/Compton College) reached on an error. With two outs, freshman pinch-hitter Alexis Rosales (Pioneer HS) walked to load the bases. Both freshman pinch-hitter Sienna Contreras (John Glenn HS) and freshman second baseman Amarie Encarnacion (Norwalk HS) drew walks to force in the first two runs before freshman third baseman Marley Cortez (Gahr HS) cleared the bases with a three-run double.

Cerritos collected just one hit the remainder of the game.

El Camino was able to tie the game with three runs in the top of the fifth inning and also scored runs in both the sixth and seventh innings.

Of the four hits on the day by the Falcons, freshman outfielder Savannah Gonzalez (Whittier HS) had two of them. Freshman pitcher Tatyana Cortez (La Serna HS) struck out three batters and now has 202 for the season. She is just the fourth pitcher in school history with over 200 strikeouts.

Photos by Daryl Peterson