KING CITY — King City Lady Mustangs improved to 10-3 overall and advanced to the Central Coast Section softball semifinals today after defeating the host King’s Academy Knights 6-2 on Monday in Sunnyvale.
The No. 5 seed Lady Mustangs will play the top seed Piedmont Hills in San Jose on Wednesday.
In the game with King’s Academy, Lisa Villanueva gave King City the lead early on by blasting a three-run homerun.
The visitors from South Monterey County were on fire with the bats as Sage Flores, Breanna Owens and winning pitcher Malaya Carrillo had multiple hits. Carrillo had five strikeouts in the complete game win.
Piedmont Hills won its opening game on Monday, defeating the No. 8 seed, Notre Dame of San Jose.
The winner of the King City and Piedmont Hills contest will play the winner of today’s game between No. 3 seed North Monterey County and No. 2 seed Notre Dame-Belmont tomorrow.
King City earned the right to play in the CCS after they beat host Carmel Padres last Wednesday by a 12-9 score.
Malaya Carrillo earned the complete game victory for the Lady Mustangs. Lisa Villanueva was the hitting star with two homeruns and five runs batted in. Alejandra Tejeda had four base hits and three RBIs. Kayla Tankersley added two solid hits, while Sage Flores played stellar defense at shortstop.
“Us coaches are confident in our girls and can’t wait to play in the CCS game,” said King City head coach Artie Carrillo. “We want our girls to go out and play their game for each other and live the moment.”
In other play-in games last week, the Gonzales Spartan softball team lost by a 10-0 score to the Robert Louis Stevenson Pirates at Pebble Beach last Tuesday; and Soledad High was beaten 12-0 in Monterey last Tuesday by the host Toreadores. Ella Wedderburn threw a no-hitter for the host team.
