Janelle Rodriquez might be the easiest player Steve Harrington has coached.
Rodriguez, a pitcher for La Habra’s softball team, might be the most challenging player he’s coached, too.
“That girl is so hard on herself,” said Harrington, in his first season coaching at La Habra after coaching at El Modena for 15 years. “She demands perfection from herself, whether it’s hitting or pitching or base running. Janelle’s her own toughest critic.”
Rodriguez acknowledged she might stress out more than she should.
“All of my coaches say I’ll never be perfect,” she said. “I hate the word ‘never.’ I’m going to try to be as perfect as I can for my teammates and my coaches.”
The junior right-hander, who committed to Cal State Fullerton was almost perfect in the pitcher’s circle Wednesday. She threw a no-hitter in the Highlanders’ 1-0 win over Villa Park. Rodriguez allowed no walks, but two Villa Park hitters reached on errors. The Highlanders are 11-1 overall and ranked No. 6 in the county.
Harrington said people with radar guns tell him they have clocked Rodriguez’ fastball at 64 mph.
“She has an incredible rise ball and an incredible down-and-out pitch,” Harrington said. “She’ll get you up and in, and she’ll get you down and out.”
That’s great, but not great enough for Rodriguez.
“I feel like I need to work a little bit harder in the circle,” she said. “I need to have more first-pitch strikes. I need to have better composure in the circle, to be there for my team so they know that ‘she’s confident, so I’m confident.’”
Taking a look around Orange County high school sports:
• The Orange County All-Star Game for boys basketball is Wednesday at 7 p.m. at Irvine Valley College. Admission is $10 for adults, $5 for children ages 5-12 and for students with valid student identification. The game is organized and managed by Open Gym Premier.
• San Clemente quarterback Jack Sears, who will be a senior next season, received a scholarship offer from Arizona. Sears, 6-foot-3 and 205 pounds, has 13 offers.
• Sears’ teammate, tight end Isaac Rex, who also will be a senior in the fall, committed to BYU.
• The sit-out period ends April 4 for transfers who did not make the change of residence that would have made them immediately eligible at their new schools.
• In baseball, that means ace junior pitcher Nick Pratto will be able to pitch for Huntington Beach. He transferred from Mater Dei. He was 6-1 with a 0.80 ERA over his freshman and sophomore years at Mater Dei, and was MVP of the World Baseball Softball Confederation World Cup last summer.
• The CIF-Southern Section’s “Blue Book,” the organization’s constitution and by-laws, includes on page 94 this entry on sit-out period expiration dates: “Question: My son was denied the Sit Out Period. May we appeal this ruling? Answer: No.”
• That probably applies to daughters, too.
• We need all-league teams. Send them to preps@ocregister.com. We don’t want to send to parents any “the reason your child’s all-league team is not published is because we never received it” emails.
• Mater Dei boys basketball coach Gary McKnight often is in Sacramento on the last weekend of the season, coaching the Monarchs in the CIF State finals, but his team was eliminated in the CIF Southern California Regionals two weeks ago. What’s he been doing since then? “My garage is awesome,” McKnight said.
• One other project McKnight worked on to near-completion was setting up next season’s Nike Extravaganza, Feb. 3 and 4 at Mater Dei. Among the teams that will be in it are Oak Hill Academy of Virginia, which will play Chino Hills. Also coming are Sierra Canyon of Chatsworth, Bishop Gorman of Las Vegas, Fairfax of Los Angeles, St. Augustine of San Diego, which will play Mater Dei, Centennial of Corona, Los Altos of Hacienda Heights, which features freshman Jarod Lucas (26 ppg this season) and all of the Trinity League teams.
• Oklahoma practiced at Mater Dei on Wednesday in preparation for its NCAA Tournament game at Honda Center.
• The CIF State basketball finals in 2017 and ’18 will be at the Golden 1 Center, the Sacramento Kings’ new downtown arena which is set to open in October. The CIF State office tries to divide which state championship events are in the north, like basketball, and which are in the south, like track and field.
• JSerra is in the market for a boys basketball coach, having not renewed the contract of Joedy Gardner. It’s a challenging place to coach, being not only a Trinity League school but being a south county Trinity League school. Talk about a challenging group of parents …
• The honorees of the National Football Foundation Orange County Chapter’s Scholar-Athlete Dinner, last week at Anaheim Convention Center, are at ocvarsity.com under the “football” tab.
• The Beach Cities Invitational track and field meet is Saturday at Huntington Beach High. Varsity events begin with the girls 1,600 at 9 a.m. Admission is $6 for adults, $3 for children and for students with valid student identification.
• Among the Beach Cities athletes will be Canyon’s Rachel Baxter and Esperanza’s Brandon Osborn. Baxter last week set the county record in the girls pole vault at 13 feet, 10 inches. Osborn bettered his county record in the boys shot put with a toss of 70 feet, 4¼ inches.
• The Beach Cities’ girls 400 meters field is strong. Entries include the county leader, Los Alamitos’ Ashley Willingham, who ran a 55.79 last weekend, and Mission Viejo’s Kennedy Gilliam, whose 56.40 is second-fastest in the county this season.
• Marina’s Jett Gordon cleared a state-best 16-9 in the pole vault during a Sunset League dual meet against Huntington Beach on Thursday at Marina.
Contact the writer: sfryer@ocregister.com
