Clear Lake can’t keep Concord off scoreboard in first-round playoff game
By Brian Sumpter
Lake County Sports on Facebook
LAKEPORT >> For a team that came close to being 10-runned, the Clear Lake Cardinals were one baserunner away from getting the potential tying run to the plate before falling 13-10 to the Concord Bears in the opening round of the North Coast Section Division 5 softball playoffs Tuesday afternoon in Lakeport.
Down 10-2 going to the going to the bottom of the fifth, Clear Lake (15-9) came all the way back to at least throw a scare Concord’s way. The Cardinals did that by scoring twice in the fifth, three times in the sixth and three times in the seventh.
Unfortunately, Clear Lake head coach Scott Schaefers couldn’t get the stop he needed from his pitching and defense in the season-ending defeat. While the Cardinals’ bats came alive late, Concord’s bats produced throughout, scoring at least one run in every inning.
Two other things clearly separated the two teams; the Bears defense came up with a couple of clutch plays during the game to deny the Cardinals, but Clear Lake’s defense never really did. Also, the Concord team was deadly efficient getting runners home from third base with less than two outs, including four sacrifice flyballs – three of them by winning pitcher Kendal Schafer (1-for-2, five RBIs) – and two RBI groundouts.
Concord also made fewer mistakes in the field while Clear Lake’s errors set up a handful of Bears runs.
The roller-coaster ride his team took him on Tuesday was nothing new for Schaefers, who said it has been like that all year.
“The story of our season,” Schaefers said. “We’ve been inconsistent, sometimes a different team every inning. While we got it together at the end (offensively), we gave them way too many chances. We still had a shot after everything we went through; we just got started too late.”
Both pitchers – Schaefer for Concord and Atiana Patino for Clear Lake – labored throughout the game. Kendal threw 171 pitches before it was over. She allowed 10 hits, walked eight and hit one. Patino, making the final start of her Clear Lake career, threw 152 pitches while surrendering nine hits, walking seven and hitting four.
The Cardinals made the most of the one advantage they clearly had – Concord’s catcher. Every time a Clear Lake hitter reached first, that runner was stealing second on virtually the next Schaefer pitch. The Cardinals were 14-for-14 on stolen bases.
Taking advantage of walks, hit batters and Clear Lake errors, and the occasional timely Concord hit, the Bears led 2-0 after one inning, 4-0 after two innings and 5-0 going to bottom of the third. Faith McIntire (2-for-3, two doubles, four RBIs) hit a sacrifice fly to give the Cardinals their first run in the bottom of the third, and a second run scored later in the inning on a fielding error. The Cardinals were looking for more with only one out but couldn’t get the hit they needed.
Concord added two runs in the fourth, including a Schaefer two-run single, and three in the fifth, loading the bases in the fifth on two walks and an error. Shay Caban (4-for-4, double, triple, RBI) delivered a one-out single to make it a 8-2 game, Ilene Garcia singled home a run, and Schaefer’s second of three sacrifice flyballs made it 10-2.
Clear Lake finally answered at that point. Cali Albaum singled home the first of two runs for the Cardinals in the bottom of the fifth, another scoring on an error.
Concord got one of those runs back in the sixth on Aaleah Hunt’s RBI groundout.
Clear Lake had a chance to do some major damage in the bottom of the sixth trailing 11-4, but had to settle for three runs. The first four Cardinals reached base – Patino (2-for-4) on an infield single, Karsyn Greer on a walk, McIntire on a two-run double and Albaum on an infield single that scored McIntire, who advanced to third on a wild pitch. With no outs, Ashlynn Cruz hit a soft line drive that Concord turned into an easy double play as the pinch-runner was halfway between second and third when shortstop Caban caught the ball. That play hurt even more when Lindee Bingham followed with a single, but the inning then ended with a groundout.
“She shouldn’t have been running (with no outs),” Schaefers said of the base-running blunder that cost the Cardinals a chance at a huge inning.
The Bears wasted no time getting a couple of those runs back in the seventh. Caban ripped a triple toward the left-field corner, Garcia was hit by a pitch, and Schaefer hit her third sacrifice fly of the game. Garcia would later score on a two-out wild pitch, making it 13-7.
Clear Lake drew back-to-back walks to open the bottom of the seventh, both runners moving into scoring position on steals. Patino’s sacrifice fly brought home one run, an exchange the Bears were happy to make, and Greer’s RBI single cut the Concord lead to 13-9. McIntire’s second RBI double of the game made it 13-10. Albaum grounded out to shortstop, sending McIntire to third. The Cardinals needed one more baserunner to get the potential tying run to the plate, but Cruz popped out to end the game.
While the two teams combined for eight errors in the field, there were some web gems to be sure. Clear Lake catcher McIntire had two of them, catching a foul pop near the backstop while facing the screen, and another in fair territory halfway up the first-base line. Center fielder Amelie Davis handled all of her flyball chances cleanly, ranging deep twice on well-struck balls to easily make catches.
For Concord, the sixth-inning double play proved huge as did another play by shortstop Caban, who backhanded a hard grounder off the bat of Davis with two outs and runners at second and third in the bottom of the second inning. She made a strong throw to first for the inning-ending out. Clear Lake put runners at second and third with no outs in the inning, but Schaefer struck out the next two batters before Caban’s play on Davis got the Bears out of the inning unscathed.
Concord’s outfield also took away extra bases from McIntire on her sacrifice fly in the third inning. McIntire kept on running on the play and pulled into second before she found out the ball had been caught, and she was shaking her head while returning to the dugout.
Clear Lake graduates five seniors and will have only one senior on next year’s roster (Cruz) barring any transfers.
“We’re losing a lot of talent with our five seniors going,” Schaefers aid. “We’ll be young again next year, just like we were two years ago.”
Davis is one of the team’s primary building blocks and is likely to move to catcher next year while pitcher Sophia Gonzales returns as a sophomore to take over for Patino.
“I will miss this team,” Schaefers said of the 2026 squads. “It had so much potential, so much heart.”
Concord plays St. Joseph/Notre Dame Friday in the quarterfinals at 4 p.m. in Alameda.