Game of the Month: Varsity Softball vs. Mitty

With the seniors equipped to play their final home game, the Panthers went head to head with the Monarchs. The last season game before WCALs for softball ended 1-0 with Mitty stealing the only run of the game due to bad communication. After Mitty’s sneaky steal, the game’s energy kept rising all the way until the final seventh inning.
After the announcements of our beloved seniors, the starting lineup took to the field with JT Wozniak as catcher, Kayla Bose on first, Kendra Meadows on second, Karina Schneider covering shortstop, Briana Fujii on third and Raquel Rinauro taking to the pitcher’s mound.
The Panthers were the first to take the field. Rinauro rallied up two strike-outs as well as taking a grounder to the glove in order to pass to Bose on first to keep Mitty contained to their dugout. By the end of the 1st inning, the game was close at 0-0.
By the second inning, Briana Fujii made a stand out catch for the third out, one of many key plays that came. Kayla Bose was up to bat and made contact with the ball, hitting the softball to right field, rounding first and heading for second. She was caught up in a pickle between first and second and almost escaped the reaching hand of Mitty’s second baseman. Meadows was the second out almost making it to first, and Pizarro supplied Mitty with their third out to go into the third inning.
Mitty, known for stealing bases, found a way around the bases from a single. Running into home, Wozniak almost tagged her as the Monarch slid past, not even touching the base. As Rinauro and Wozniak went for a pep talk, Mitty went to touch the plate, scoring the only run of the game. “I was upset when I first realized that JT didn’t make the tag, but I knew the game wasn’t over yet and we still had a chance,” said senior Raquel Rinauro.
Krista Jensen caught a fly from right field and Schneider tagged a runner at second, changing the energy of the game. From that point, the Panthers kept trying to fight back with Fujii making three solid outs and Larissa Rinauro making the play of the game with a sliding catch at second, keeping Mitty away from home and scoring position. All Presentation could get were foul balls. Raquel Rinauro commented after the game, “Overall, the game went really well. We just couldn’t capitalize on their errors.” Players of the game include Briana Fujii and Karina Schneider. The Panthers will go to their CCS tournament this upcoming week.

WCAL and CCS Roundups: Basketball and Soccer

Presentation’s soccer and basketball teams have given excellent showings at this year’s WCAL and CCS championships. The Presentation soccer team finishing first at the WCAL championship and tied with Aragon High School at the CCS championship. The Basketball team finished fourth in WCAL and second in CCS.

For those who are not familiar with WCAL, CCS, and all of the workings of the high school sports league, here is a little background. The WCAL stands for the West Catholic Athletic League and consists of eleven Catholic schools. CCS stands for Central Coast Section Championship and starts after WCAL is finished.

For basketball and soccer, the teams play the regular season, known as Round Robin, and then participate in the league playoffs. The winner of the most games during the season is the winner of Round Robin and WCAL champion. If a different team wins the league playoffs, then the two teams are co-champions, but if it is the same team only one champion remains.

The soccer team’s season consisted of nine wins, two losses, and one tie. The team advanced to WCAL holding the highest seed. The team played St. Ignatius in the final round of the tournament, finishing with a 3-0 win over Saint Ignatius. Seniors Shelby Galaviz and Emma Caringello, as well as junior Aneska Alino, scored the three goals. Seniors Michelle Kay and Taylor Johnson performed two important assists.

The soccer team finished off the season with a nail biting game against Aragon High School. They played into double overtime and finished with a tie, making the Pres soccer team CCS Co-Champions. “Our team was very focused and composed from the start. We knew that if we wanted it, we had to work for it,” said senior Taryn Phillips.

The basketball team finished the league season with five wins and seven losses. The team finished fourth at the WCAL championships with a one point lead over Valley Christian. “It was a close game all the way through, but we were able to keep our lead and pull it out,” said senior Savannah Morgan.

“At the beginning of the year the basketball team was undefeated,” said Athletic Director Ryan Cooling. “Then they had a couple key injuries and went into league down a couple of players. They played hard and did really well, but having these key players back again has really helped them out.”

Good luck to the basketball team who will be advancing to the NorCal Championships, and congratulations to the Pres champion soccer team.

Golf Team Takes a Swing at CCS Title

Congratulations to the Presentation High School Varsity Golf Team who on Tuesday November 3 traveled to the Carmel Valley to compete in the CCS Championships. They did an excellent job and finished second overall to their rival, Saint Ignatius. This tournament was held at Rancho Cañada Golf course from 8am to 3pm.

Presentation’s golf team has had a great season this year. They were undefeated the entire season until West Catholic Athletic League tournament (WCAL) where they narrowly lost to Saint Ignatius. Due to their excellent record throughout the year, the loss to SI made them co-champions in the WCAL tournament and granted Presentation a bid for CCS Championships.

For those Pres students who do not know that much about golf, here is a quick explanation. There are 18 holes in the CCS tournament. The holes are graded by how far the tee (where the golfer starts) is from the green (where the hole is). There are three different levels, a par-three, par-four and par-five. Par means the number of times it takes to hit the ball before it lands in the hole. The goal is to hit below or at par. For example, the golfer tries to get the ball in the hole with one shot and two putts on a three-par hole. 

Each person on the team plays the full 18 holes and then the top four scores are added up. At CCS, there is both a team title and an individual championship title. Last year was the first year that Pres had an individual champion, junior Mariko Tumangan. Last year Pres also placed second overall, which is the highest team title Pres has had at CCS. This year, coach Angie Papangellin seemed very positive and thought the team would do very well. She said, “The team is looking pretty good, but golf is a difficult sport to predict.” Varsity golf member Ramey Parks agreed with her coach saying, “Throughout the whole season we have had many moments where we have had to knuckle down and we have handled the pressure very well. I am very excited because I think if we are all in the right state of mind we could do very well.” She was right, for this year’s team was solid and their results proved it!

The team started off on a great foot when Tumangan finished with a record 62 strokes (10 strokes under par). Next up was Alessandra Cain who scored an 82, then Ramey Parks who scored a 91 and Swetha Prabhakaran finishing with an 85. These top four scores earned Presentation a second place finish. Saint Ignatius finished first 19 strokes below Pres and Santa Catalina finished third with 6 strokes above Pres. “I was a little nervous going in,” said Ramey. “The best part of the whole day was when we got to the course.  Everyone was so excited and the whole place was filled with golfers of unbelievable skill. We ended up doing really well and I am excited for NorCals.”

Since Pres finished in the top four, they qualified to compete in the Nor Cal tournament. This tournament took place on November 9 at the Almaden Country Club, Presentation’s home course. They performed admirably and finished sixth overall. Unfortunately, this finish did not qualify them to move onto the state championships. Overall, the Presentation Golf Team had an incredible year. Congratulations again to the amazing team. They did a phenomenal job this year and represented our school with pride.