Colton defeats ACH for State 1B softball title
YAKIMA – The Colton Wildcats made history and settled a score with rival Almira/Coulee-Hartline on Saturday, winning a third straight State 1B softball championship, 10-8 at the Gateway Sports Complex.
The third consecutive title is the first for any school in the 20-year fastpitch era. A number of schools had won back-to-back titles, including 4A Kelso in 2009 and 2010. But the Highlanders didn’t qualify for state this year, leaving Colton alone to pursue history.
The win avenged a District 7 loss to ACH for Colton (23-2). It also gave the Wildcats a win in the rubber match of a contest for 1B girls sports supremacy. ACH won the volleyball title in the fall of 2010, and Colton won the basketball title – beating ACH.
The win also means a trip to the tattoo parlor for Colton coach Brad Nilson, to add the year 2011 to the title artwork that adorns his right shoulder.
The Warriors (24-2) seemed to have taken the measure of Colton pitcher Mikayla Nygren early, scratching runs across in the first and third innings and banging out five hits in the first three frames. But they couldn’t put anything together.
“Our girls got a little dry in the middle of the game,” ACH coach Nicole Evans said. “We started swinging at some bad pitches. Once they figured it out and started laying off those, we started making her throw down the middle.”
Colton scored 10 runs across the middle four innings, tagging the Warriors’ Sarah Gloyn and Madeline Issak for 14 hits, including a mammoth home run by first baseman Meghan Heitstuman.
Faced with an imposing 10-3 hole heading into the sixth inning, the Warriors scored five times in the final two frames and appeared ready to force the game into extra innings. But consecutive forceouts at the plate with the bases loaded in the seventh inning ended the threat.
• Garfield-Palouse sent 17 batters to the plate in the top of the seventh inning and 12 of them scored as the Vikings rallied for a 16-5 victory over the Selkirk Rangers in the game to decide third and fourth places.
Erin Witthuhn went 4 for 5 and drove in the go-ahead run in the decisive seventh.
Gar-Pal advanced to the trophy game by beating the Sunnyside Christian Knights 4-0 to begin the day. Emily Witthuhn struck out six in a complete-game five-hitter and added a two-run triple in the fifth inning.
Selkirk moved into the trophy game by beating Wishkah Valley 10-0 in its second-day opener. Courtney Holter surrendered two hits while striking out eight. Anemarie Cain drove in four runs and Jessica Reiber went 3 for 4 for Selkirk.