After playing one of the tougher schedules in Southern California, the Cerritos College softball team was seeded #10 for the regional playoffs and will travel to #7-seeded San Diego Mesa next weekend in a best-of-three series. The Falcons (29-10) will take on the Olympians (30-8), co-champions of the Pacific Coast Conference on Saturday at 2:00 p.m. in the first game of the series. The series continues at noon on Sunday and a third game to be played at 2:00 p.m. on Sunday, if necessary.

Cerritos finished in second place in the South Coast Conference and have not faced San Diego Mesa this season. Of the 10 losses suffered by the Falcons, all of them were against teams that will be making post-season appearances and all are seeded ahead of Cerritos. The team enters the playoffs on a six-game winning streak and have also won 10 of their last 11 games. In the 10 losses suffered this year, six have been by two runs or less.

As for the Olympians, they shared their conference title with Palomar College and defeated Grossmont College, 8-2 in their final game to earn a share of that title. SD Mesa is 12-3 against teams that made the playoffs this year, while the Falcons are 5-10 against playoff teams.

As a team, San Diego Mesa is batting .365 on the year and have four regulars batting over .400 with Alexandra Mootry pacing them with a .436 mark and a team-high 30 RBI. They rely primarily on Laura Nelson in the circle, who has a 20-7 record. For the Falcons, they are hitting at a .386 team clip and have displayed power with 30 home runs and 70 doubles. Eight of the nine regular batters are hitting over .400 on the year with freshman Jamie Ramirez hitting .458 and also adding an 11-3 record in the circle. Sophomore Andrea Arellano leads the team with 11 home runs and 53 RBI, while hitting .436.

Southern California Regional Playoff Pairings:

#16 Ventura (20-17) @ @1 Riverside (36-3)
#9 College of the Desert (29-8) @ #8 Santa Ana (26-14)
#13 Moorpark (24-12-1) @ #4 Palomar (25-11)
#12 Saddleback (22-14) @ #5 College of the Canyons (20-8-2)

#14 Citrus (24-12) @ #3 Cypress (33-7)
#11 Grossmont (24-13) @ #6 Santiago Canyon (30-9)
#10 Cerritos (29-10) @ #7 San Diego Mesa (30-8)
#15 Chaffey (25-15) @ #2 Mt. San Antonio (35-4)

Photo by Daryl Peterson