Hancock College sophomore Lori Valadez and her doubles partner, freshman Carlene Holst, traded shots with Cuesta/s Kelly Paine and Breanne Greer for awhile.

Then Valadez came to a quick realization.

"They could rally pretty darn good," she said. "We had to mix it up some."

Valadez and Holst hit enough well-placed shots to defeat Paine and Greer 8-4 in the No. 1 doubles match. Their win gave Hancock a 5-4 victory in a showdown Tuesday at Hancock between the Western State Conference/s top teams.

Hancock is 6-0 in the WSC and 7-1 overall. Cuesta, 6-1 in the WSC, took its first loss this season. Dating back to last year, when they tied Ventura for the WSC title, the Bulldogs have won 16 consecutive matches.

They host Glendale at 2 p.m. Thursday in another WSC match. The match Tuesday was a makeup of an earlier scheduled one between the teams that was rained out.

The Bulldogs and Cougars were tied 3-3 after singles matches. Valadez pulled the Bulldogs even by beating Jessie Ritchie 6-1, 3-6, 7-6 (8-6) in a hard-fought No. 1 singles match.

Just before the doubles matches started, "I told them, /Let/s win it here,/" said Hancock coach Ginny Barnett.

"It worked. They said, /yeah!/"

Valadez and Holst trailed 3-2, and then they made Barnett/s short motivational speech work by being the steadier doubles team.

Both doubles pairs hit the ball hard, but Valadez and the left-handed Holst hit a good variety of shots and made far fewer errors the last half of the match. The match ended when Paine/s forehand return of Holst/s serve hit the low part of the net.

Holst scored a big singles win earlier for Hancock when she defeated Paine 4-6, 6-3, 6-1 at No. 3 singles.

"She was up the whole time," Barnett said of Holst. "Even though she lost the first set, it was close and she had led early. So she was pretty confident."

Monica Krier, who is 6-0 in singles this year, also had a big day for the Bulldogs. She beat Jen White 6-2, 6-1 at No. 2 singles, then she and Clairol Lozano pulled the Bulldogs even at 4-4 when they defeated Ritchie and White 8-3 at No. 2 doubles.

"I feel I/ve made a lot of progress in my game since last year," said Krier, a sophomore who has played her entire Hancock career at No. 2 singles and No. 1 doubles.

"It took a long time getting used to playing singles after playing just doubles before," at Righetti High, Krier said. She chuckled. "It/s great playing under Lori. I don/t want to be playing No. 1."

The match was as close as the score indicated. Hancock won 88 games to Cuesta/s 81.

There were three three-set singles matches. At No. 5, Mary Monley gave Cuesta a brief 3-2 lead by rallying past Carly Barnett, 5-7, 6-4, 6-2. Valadez tied the match moments later with a backhand overhead winner against Ritchie.

"It would have been nice to win four, even five singles matches, but I was confident at 3-3 going into doubles," Ginny Barnett said. "I/ve felt very confident in our doubles teams.

"Looking at the scores, comparable against the same opponents, I knew it would be tight Cuesta/s girls are almost the exactly the same as ours 7 patient, they/ll rally all day. And night. Some of them were out there two and a half hours."

Softball

Hancock 8-5, SB 7-6

The teams ended a long day of softball with a split. The Bulldogs are now 3-5 in the WSC and 4-13 overall.

Stephanie Silva hit a triple in the sixth inning of the opener and then scored the winning run on an error on Lena Felix/s ground ball.

The Vaqueros had tied the game after Hancock took a three-run lead with six first-inning runs.

Losing pitcher Dalia Daniels (0-2) went 3-for-4 in the second game. So did teammate Nika Miller, and Felix tripled. The Bulldogs, however, came up short.

Crystal Garcia (3-2) was the winning pitcher in the first game. Maria Coder (2-1) took the loss. Jessica Hurtado (2-2) earned the win for Santa Barbara in game two.

All four starting pitchers went the distance. Hancock plays at Moorpark at 2:30 p.m. Thursday in a WSC game.

Baseball

Hancock 8, Moorpark 1

MOORPARK 7 Robb Rico hit Hancock starter Adam Campbell/s first pitch for a solo home run in the first inning. Then the Raiders scored no more.

The Bulldogs (5-1, 8-4) took command of this WSC North Division game with seven fourth-inning runs. Campbell went seven innings to get the win.

Eric Bowman capped off Hancock/s fourth with a grand slam home run. Jason Carlson hit a solo home run for the Bulldogs in the ninth.

Jimmy Van Ostrand went 3-for-5 for the Bulldogs, and Kory Langwell and Marc Verbryke were both 2-for-4. Ben Hodges had a hit and extended his hitting streak to 12 games.

The Bulldogs play at WSC North rival Oxnard at 2 p.m. Thursday.

Cuesta 10, Ventura 6

SAN LUIS OBISPO 7 Two bases-loaded singles and St. Joseph/s Dustin Kelly/s two-run single added up to a four-run second inning. That lifted the Cougars (3-3, 5-7) to a WSC victory.

Cuesta led 10-0 before the Pirates scored three seventh-inning runs.

March 17, 2004