GARDEN GROVE It has become a staple in the last week of the softball regular season, Division 1 power Pacifica squaring off against Division 2 juggernaut Mission Viejo in a postseason tune-up.
After tying the score in the seventh inning to send the game to extra innings, the third-ranked Diablos received timely hits from Olivia Viggiano and Allison Harvey in a three-run ninth to top No. 6 Pacifica, 4-2, in a nonleague showdown at Pacifica on Wednesday afternoon.
“That’s why we play,” Mission Viejo coach Troy Ybarra said. “These games mean something. Even though it’s a nonleague game, an end-of-the-season game, the energy level going into the seventh (inning) was like a playoff game. The girls knew it and they competed.”
This was the third consecutive year the two county powers met in the final week of the regular season, and two of the battles have gone into extras.
With Mission Viejo trailing, 1-0, with two outs in the seventh, Diablos third baseman Camryn Ybarra singled behind the second base bag to drive in the tying run.
Mission Viejo loaded the bases with two outs in the ninth, and scored the go-ahead run on Viggiano’s slow dribbler to the left side of the infield. Harvey followed with a line drive single to left, scoring a pair of runs.
Viggiano and Ybarra each finished with three hits atop Mission Viejo’s order.
Pacifica catcher Dejah Mulipola went 3 for 4. Jaymee Campbell had an RBI single in the fourth, and Irieanna Naea hit a solo home run to left field in the ninth.
Contact the writer: kconnolly@ocregister.com
