Softball: Aliso escapes

Joseph Boo

NEWPORT BEACH - A strange and exciting game between Newport Harbor

and visiting Aliso Niguel was decided, appropriately enough, by a strange

and exciting play as the Sailors bowed out from the 2000 campaign Friday

afternoon on the Newport campus.

In the eighth inning with the score tied, 3-3, Newport second baseman

Athena Vasquez made an amazing sliding catch of a pop fly in first-base

foul territory. But she banged her knee against the fence on the slide,

and while Vasquez was down, the Wolverines’ winning run came in for a 4-3

Sea View League victory on Friday.

Controversy came right after Vasquez’s catch. After Aliso’s runner moved

to third on the fly out, she took off for home when she realized Vasquez

was hurt. Newport third baseman Lindsay Moore grabbed the ball out of

Vasquez’s glove and threw to catcher Lisa Huntington.

Huntington got the ball just as the runner got there, and she positioned

herself in front of the plate. The runner slid in and the umpire signaled

safe.

“I thought she was out,” Newport Coach Jess Martinson, along with the

rest of Newport’s contingent, said. “But hey, that’s my team, and those

our my players. So I have to support them.”

Vasquez emerged with two cuts on her knees. But she got up and finished

the game.

In the season’s last game, the Sailors (9-15, 0-8 in league) came very

close to getting their first league win and pulling off one of the year’s

biggest upsets against Sea View League champ Aliso Niguel, ranked No. 10

in CIF Southern Section Division II and boasting a 7-1 league record, 19-7 overall.

Newport roughed up Aliso starter Jessica Skaare for three runs in the

first four innings. Newport’s first run came in the first when Vasquez

scored on a bunt by Moore.

The Sailors’ biggest hit came from senior shortstop Kristen Smith. She

ripped a two-run double in the second that almost went over the

left-center fence. That scored Mariko Mikami, who reached on a double,

and Vasquez.

Newport held on to a 3-2 lead for most of the game behind pitcher Mikami.

But Aliso tied the game in the sixth with a sacrifice fly. And that set

up the dramatics in the extra inning.

“This was a great game,” Martinson said. “A great, great game. I knew the

girls were capable of playing a game like this. I knew the talent we had

on this team, and that if they put it together, we could play like this.”

“It’s very nice to close out the year by playing one of our best games

this year.”

SEA VIEW LEAGUE

Aliso Niguel 4, Newport Harbor 3 (eight innings)

Aliso Niguel 020 001 01 - 4 6 2

Newport Harbor 120 000 00 - 3 6 2

Skaare, Wiebert and Jarvis; Mikami and Huntington. W - Wiebert. L -

Mikami. 2B - Mikami (NH), Smith (NH).