Redondo Sunset Softball All-Stars Advance

The 14 & under girls softball team from Redondo Sunset took third place at the ASA Central/South Bay District Championship Tournament over the July 4th weekend. 

After a tough 6-5 loss to Norwalk in their opening game on Friday night, they had to fight their way through the loser's bracket on Saturday and Sunday to claim the Bronze Medal and advance to the State Championship Tournament July 16-18 in Camarillo.

They won three elimination games on their way to the semifinals, beating Montebello, Central Orange and Pico Rivera. The three-game winning streak included an 11-10 victory against Central Orange in eight innings that went to the international tiebreaker.

Redondo scored in the bottom of the seventh to tie it when Katrina Cohen raced home from second on a ground ball. The game then went to the tiebreaker - a runner is placed on second base to start the inning with the hope of producing more offense. Redondo gave up a run in the top of the eighth but came back to score two runs in the bottom of the inning to win the game. Redondo eventually lost to Buena Park 1-0 to finish in third place.

"The girls played awesome the entire weekend, they never gave up,'' said Dave Cohen, the team's co-manager. ''We'll see what happens next week."

The tiebreaker game was the highlight for many of the players including Bobbie Hollerup, who scored the winning run. "That game was nerve racking," she said.

"That was the most stressful game we ever played," Brooke Vaughn added.

Mark Allen, the other co-manager,  feels this team has a lot of good qualities going forward. "We have great pitching and defense, probably the best defense of any team in the area,'' he said. ''We hit the ball hard but if we run into a hot pitcher, we can make adjustments and go to small ball. We have been working on our bunting all week."

The Sunset team includes, Lyndsay Allen, Cohen, Madison East, Kammy Fisher, Hollerup, Aurora Hurd, Shelby Mathews, Marissa Mitter, Susannah Muno, Kathleen Vaughan, Brooke Vaughn and Britney Weller. It is a team filled with several multi-sport stars excelling in other sports including soccer and volleyball.

Three of the players - Allen, Mitter and Muno - played recently in the Junior National Olympics volleyball tournament in Reno. They competed on three different club volleyball teams with Muno's Long Beach Mizuno team finishing in second place. Only 32 teams from over 1,000 teams around the country make it to this prestigious tournament.

"Playing catcher in a long softball tournament is harder than playing in a volleyball tournament," said Allen, who will be playing both sports next year at Bishop Montgomery.

Mitter will be going to Redondo Union to play volleyball and softball. "I learned a lot at Sunset and had a lot of fun. It will be sad to leave. We did really well in the tournament after losing the first game," she said.

Cohen just returned from a Nike soccer tournament where her U14 team finished eighth against the top 20 teams in the country. She is the team's star pitcher and will play soccer and softball at Redondo Union high next year, setting up future battles with Allen when Redondo plays Bishop Montgomery in softball. "I'll throw a screw ball a little inside to Lyndsay when I pitch against her," she said.

Cohen pitched 28 of the 30 innings in the All-Star tournament, striking out 24 batters in the five games. She made perhaps the most important play of the tournament. When trailing by one run in the bottom of the seventh in the victory over Central Orange, she raced home from second base on a ground out to tie the game and forced the International tiebreaker. Cohen batted .467 with two doubles, seven RBI and four runs scored.

Muno bats in the leadoff position and hit .500, scored seven runs and also played outstanding defense at shortstop.

Allen caught 28 of the 30 innings, batted .462 with five RBIs and three runs scored. She threw out two of the three players that tried to steal, tagged out two runners at the plate during the Central Orange game and had a scoring fly ball that led to the win against Pico Rivera.

Mitter batted .444, with five RBI, six runs scored and hit a 2-run homer against Montebello to start the scoring frenzy.