With baseball, softball and boys lacrosse going on simultaneously at Hilltop High School on Thursday, the spring sports season was already humming.
The Lancers hosted Rancho Buena Vista in a Hilltop-Lolita’s baseball tournament game while the school’s softball team was playing its first game in the 38th annual Hilltop tournament. Meanwhile, the boys lacrosse team was hosting University City in its first home game of the season.
The Lady Lancers defeated Clairemont, 2-1, to jump-start the softball tournament. Junior contributor Yasmine Clark tossed a three-hitter while allowing one earned run and striking out three batters.
This year’s Hilltop tournament includes 16 teams divided into two pools of eight teams. The winner of each pool will advance to the championship game on March 12 at 3 p.m. Consolation games will start off the day at 8 a.m.
Participating teams include Clairemont, Helix, Valhalla, Bonita Vista, University City, El Capital, El Centro Southwest, Otay Ranch, Holtville, Point Loma, Steele Canyon, Calexico, West Hills, Mission Hills and Olympian besides the host Lady Lancers.
Teams will play four pool games.
Hilltop advanced to last year’s tournament final against eventual champion Mission Hills.
Hilltop coach Juan Reyes said both Valhalla (6-1 record) and Steele Canyon (7-2 record) are off to strong starts.
In other tournament games on Tuesday, Bonita Vista defeated Clairemont, 12-2, while Holtville edged Otay Ranch, 2-1. Valhalla topped El Centro Southwest, 8-2, in another tournament game on Tuesday.
Senior co-captain Lily Hermosillo is being counted on as one of Hilltop’s team leaders this season. Photos by Phillip Brents
“It’s a very good field with powerhouse Mission Hills (7-1 record), reigning Division II champion Otay Ranch, Division IV champion Holtville, Bonita Vista from the Open Division and Division II runner-up Helix,” Reyes said.
Hilltop, which finished 1-3 in the preceding Cougar Classic tournament, improved to 2-3 on the season following Thursday’s win over the Lady Chieftains (3-5).
Key players for the Lady Lancers this season include senior captains Sofia Vega, Lily Hermosillo and Alexyia Reyes, along with Clark and Bayfront Charter sophomore transfer Elijah Medina.
Medina started the season with a .364 hitting average through four games while Vega and Reyes were both hitting .333. Hermosillo (.273 batting average) led the team with four RBI.
Hilltop will test El Capitan and Valhalla in games Saturday morning and University City next Thursday afternoon to wrap up tournament play.
“I see us in the running at our own tournament,” Reyes said optimistically.
Among local squads, Bonita Vista is off to a 6-2 start while Otay Ranch is 4-3 and Olympian is 2-5.
Bonita Vista shut out University City, 10-0, on Thursday.
Hardball High
Hilltop dropped to 0-5 on the season following a 5-0 loss to Rancho Buena Vista on Thursday in a matchup of 0-4 teams.
Ten teams are participating in this year’s Hilltop-Lolitas tournament. Hilltop and Bonita Vista are representing the Metro Conference while Granite Hills and Santana are representing the Grossmont Conference. Poway, RBV, La Costa Canyon, Classical Academy, Del Norte and Cathedral Catholic round out this year’s field.
Hilltop coach Kurt Gritts said the tournament ranks as one of the section’s annual top early season events.
“We have quality teams who are playing,” Gritts said. “We find out who the top teams are and how much better we need to get early on.”
Granite Hills won last year’s Division I section championship before going on to capture a Division III regional championship title.
The Eagles are off to a 3-1 start this season following wins over LCC (6-5 on Feb. 24), Poway(6-1 on Feb. 26) and Classical Academy (26-4 on Monday) and a 16-12 loss in eight innings to Bonita Vista on Tuesday.
Granite Hills, led by senior Hudson Beamon’s five RBI and freshman Parker Vance’s four RBI, rapped out 17 hits in the lopsided win over Classical Academy. Two other Eagles collected three RBI in the game: junior Camden Sos and senior Grant MacArthur.
The tournament championship game is scheduled this Saturday at 1 p.m. at Hilltop. Santana (4-1) and Granite Hills will pair up in an all-East County final.
The Sultans have defeated Del Norte (1-0 on Feb. 25), RBV (13-1 on Feb. 26), Cathedral Catholic (3-1 on Tuesday) and Hilltop (7-1 on Wednesday) in tournament play.
Senior Caleb Harris drove in three runs in Wednesday’s game against the Lancers while seniors Elijah Reber and Ethan Wright both scored two runs.
Senior Tyler Begg and Wright both plated three runs in the 17-hit win over RBV while four pitchers combined on a four-hitter.
The Metro Conference has split back into three leagues. Hilltop will compete in the Metro-South Bay League this year alongside Mar Vista, Mater Dei Catholic and Southwest.
Southwest is 3-1 to start the season while Mar Vista is 4-3 and Mater Dei Catholic is 0-4.
“It’s a wait and see scenario,” Gritts said about any league predictions. “We’ll see how we’re doing in two weeks. If we’re playing well, we’ll be OK.”
Boys lacrosse
This year’s Metro Conference lineup will be compressed into one seven-team lineup with each team playing the other once for six league games. League membership for this spring includes Bonita Vista, Eastlake, Hilltop, Mar Vista, Mater Dei Catholic, Olympian and Otay Ranch.
Top returners for Hilltop include Kyle DePratti, Damion Cepeda and Josh Loredo.
The Lancers opened their season with a 3-2 non-league loss at Olympian on Monday and fell to 0-2 on the early season with Thursday’s 14-5 home loss to University City in another non-league encounter.
Hilltop will play Olympian and Otay Ranch twice — once in league and once in non-league.
Olympian goal-scorers against Hilltop included sophomore attackman Ethan Managbanag, sophomore defenseman Ethan Mallon and senior midfielder Francisco Pinedo. Senior goalie Andrew Leibold made 11 saves on 13 shots. Mallon also had one assist.
In games on Wednesday, Bonita Vista dropped a 10-8 non-league decision at Valhalla while Olympian fell to 1-1 on the season following a 5-1 loss at Foothills Christian.
This year’s section lineup includes 58 teams. Carlsbad, Point Loma, San Diego and Santana were all off to 2-0 starts entering Thursday’s slate of games.
Hilltop High School Boys Lacrosse
Photo Gallery by Phillip Brents
