Manteca coach Josh Farris and the rest of the Buffaloes are glad to finally be on the winning side of these battles with Oakdale.
This time, it was the Buffs who ended their Valley Oak League rivals’ season, cruising 8-1 in a Sac-Joaquin Section Division III quarterfinal at home Friday.
Manteca (21-8), seeded fourth, has won just two of its last 17 meetings with the No. 5 Mustangs (15-11) going back to 2018, and both victories have come this season.
Last year, they faced off in a semifinal at Oakdale, which plated the tying run in the bottom of the seventh and won it in the eighth, 2-1. The Mustangs halted what had been an historic run for Manteca and went on to capture the SJS Division III championship.
Now, Manteca is back in the semifinals for just the second time in program history and will take another shot at VOL outright titlist Central Catholic.
“I don’t know if I’m ever going to get over last year’s loss to them — that’s probably one of the hardest losses of my career at any sport I’ve coached,” Farris said. “And two years prior to that, they knocked us out of the playoffs.
“I think the big difference in these (playoff) games with them is that those two times we lost it was at their place, and this one as at home. We had good crowd energy, the dugout was good and it feels good to actually be on the right side of this one, for a change.”
A six-inning burst in the bottom of the second inning gave starting pitcher Riley Ward all the support she needed. Alesia Harris drew a bases-loaded walk to tie it at 1-1. Then Bella Cooper and Sienna Owen drilled back-to-back, two-run hits. They each finished with two hits and two RBIs. Jocelyn Baptist capped the rally with an RBI knock.
It was a good bounce-back inning after a rough first for the Buffaloes. An error followed by a misplayed blooper to shallow right-center field — where three Manteca fielders stood and watched the ball drop between them — allowed Oakdale to plate the first run. Katee Conde drove in Jacyci Volonte (walked) on the play.
Manteca appeared prime to counter in the bottom half with Cooper and Owen walking and stealing their way into scoring positions with no outs. Oakdale ace pitcher Jaelyn Lee got out of it with a strikeout and a line drive to third base that ended up in a double play.
“I just think we locked in after that,” Ward said. “We really had to focus, but we knew it was still early and that we can score runs.”
Manteca added two more for good measure in the sixth. Cooper singled up the middle to bring home Maleiah Garza, and Sienna Owen drove in Ward on a sacrifice fly to left.
“Those girls at the top of the lineup are finally getting it going and locked in,” Farris said of Cooper and Owen, both transfers from East Union who had to miss the first month of the season. “They had to sit out for so long, and now they’re getting there. Their speed causes a lot of problems. You put those two on the bases, and then you have people like Lo (Lauren Moncada) and Jocelyn (Baptist) and Ayva (Wilkins) behind them and it just makes our lineup tough to get outs on.”
Ward struck out three in six innings, giving up an unearned run on five hits and four walks. Reliever Isabel Tonna needed just nine pitches to get the final three outs of the game.
“A lot of teams have an ace, and we don’t really have one pitcher that does it all — we a staff,” Farris said. “I keep telling them it doesn’t matter who starts, it matters who can get us outs when we need them. They’re both very, very good pitchers, and they feed off each other well and root for each other.
“I’m super proud of Riley today, though. She pitched really, really well and let our defense work behind her.”
For Oakdale, the Pacific-bound Lee struggled with command early on, as the shoulder and knee injuries that have hampered her of late flared up again. The Mustangs were already without standout Madi Bohannon, a Cal Poly-committed shortstop who injured an ankle in their regular-season finale at East Union.
“We thought (Lee) was over it for the first round of the playoffs, and she pitched without pain, but it came back this morning when she was warming up,” Oakdale coach Larry Loger said. “She and (Bohannon) are our best players, but you have to play with who’s healthy. Our back-up catcher is hurt, our back-up first baseman is hurt and our center fielder is hurt, but we just didn’t hit the ball like we can.”
Manteca is now a win away from making its first final-round appearance but must get past another familiar foe that has had its number.
Top-seeded Central Catholic (25-5) has won eight of its last nine meetings with the Buffaloes and is ranked No. 23 in the state by MaxPreps. Manteca face the Raiders in Modesto next Tuesday. Third-seeded Ponderosa (16-8) visits No. 2 Vanden (19-4) in the other semifinal.
“When the brackets came out, I wasn’t super pleased that they stuck three VOL teams on the same side of the bracket,” Farris said. “It was almost like this game was a play-in to see who can play CC. We have a lot of respect for CC, they have great players all across the diamond. We played them close the first time (3-1) and they handled us the second time (8-0). I feel like we can have some success against them if our lineup gets going. We’re healthy, but they’re tough to beat right now. We’re up for the challenge.”
