Historic win for Pirates as they stun Chargers, 10-4

COSTA MESA -- It took 27 years and lots and lots of attempts, but the Orange Coast College softball team made a little history on Friday by topping Cypress College, 10-4 on Friday at the OCC Softball Complex.

It was the first win for the Pirates over the powerhouse Chargers since the 1996 season when Coast pulled out a 1-0 win, over 70 matchups ago. 

Against the No. 3 team in the state, the Pirates (9-15, 6-7 in the Orange Empire Conference) came out and jumped on the Chargers (27-4, 12-2) early using back-to-back, four-run innings to jump out to an 8-1 lead after three innings of play.

The bats came alive against Cypress' top pitcher, Emily Bush (18-3) in the second inning. Nadia Perez led off with a bloop-triple to center and scored on an RBI-double off the bat of Lexi Gamez. Three batters later, Taylor Andolsek lined a double to right-center, scoring Gamez to put the Pirates in front, 2-1.  That brought up OCC's hottest hitter -- Arianna Williams -- who promptly launched a two-run home run to right-center, putting the Pirates up, 4-1. 

OCC starter Angela Whitmer retired the Chargers in order in the top of the third, setting up more fireworks for the Pirates in the bottom half of the inning. Coast took advantage of three Cypress errors and ripped four more hits to score four more runs to pull ahead, 8-1. An RBI-double by Perez, a two-run double by Natalie Lowthers and an RBI-single by Williams pushed Coast to a sizeable advantage.

Cypress would not just roll over and used a run in the fourth and two runs in the fifth to pull to within four at 8-4. But Whitmer refused to allow the Chargers to use a big inning to get back into the game, holding the Chargers -- a team with a .372 team batting average entering Friday's game -- to just four runs on nine hits. She walked only one batter, while striking out six in a complete-game gem.

Rush allowed 10 runs (six earned) on 12 hits with a walk and four strikeouts for Cypress. 

Coast added some important padding on the scoreboard in the bottom of the sixth inning as an RBI-single by Williams and an RBI-single off the bat of Perez pushed the lead back up to six, with just three outs to go. Whitmer remained poised and retired the Chargers in order in the seventh to give the Pirates the HUGE upset win.

Williams finished 4-for-4 with two runs and four RBI for OCC, while Perez added three hits, two runs and two RBI and Andolsek slugged two hits, scored twice and drove in two.

The Pirates will return to action on Monday at Citrus College before returning to the OCC Softball Complex for a makeup game on Tuesday against San Bernardino Valley College, beginning at 2 p.m.