STORY BY MATT SIMON
Sophomore Hailey Houston and Wilson softball had something special brewing on Tuesday at Joe Rodgers as the Bruins cruised to a 10-3 victory over San Marcos in the second round of the CIF Southern Section Division 3 playoffs.
After giving up a leadoff single to start the game, Houston retired the Royals in order with two of her eight strikeouts. The sophomore then helped her own cause when she drilled an RBI triple to left field that allowed Sinclair Lawhorn to score to give Wilson an early 1-0 lead.
“I always love hitting second,” Houston said of her 2-for-4 outing at the plate. “Especially with Sinclair hitting before me. She gives me a lot of confidence when she gets on.”
In the circle, Houston pitched a complete game while giving up three runs. Two of those came after Wilson took a 10-1 lead into the seventh inning.
With a total of 16 hits, the Bruins led wire-to-wire while scoring in four of the six innings.
Sophomore catcher Natalya Rodriguez made her own highlight play in the second inning when she drilled a line drive to right field for an inside-the-park home run that gave Wilson a 4-0 lead.
“Every at-bat is for my team,” Rodriguez said. “It’s CIF, so you got to leave it all out on the field. When my coach was about to stop me at third, I was like ‘No, I’m going home. I want to score this is for my team and I want to win this round to move on’.”
The Bruins will now host Troy (13-15) on Thursday at 3:15 p.m. and Wilson coach George Molina is happy to have a chance to play in front of the home crowd again. It is Wilson’s first quarterfinal at home in more than a decade.
“I’m real proud of the girls,” Molina said. “We’re peaking at the right time, we’re going to have to bring this same mentality on Thursday and if we do, we have a good shot.”
