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There’s been a shakeup in the state rankings in California and Florida over the last two weeks, but not in Texas, which is partly why the new No. 1 team in the Extra Elite 80 is Lake Creek of Montgomery, Texas.
First, here’s what happened in California. Previous No. 1 Villa Park has hit a snag to its season due to an ankle injury suffered by leading player/pitcher Sydney Somerndike. The Arizona commit suffered the injury last weekend at the Michelle Carew Classic. While the Spartans were able to complete a 1-0 win over Beaumont without her, they lost in the quarterfinals to Lutheran of Orange and since then have lost two more times, including the latest on Tuesday of this week to league rival Esperanza.
Clovis North of Fresno and Oaks Christian of Westlake Village have moved to the top two spots in California. The Broncos didn’t play last week, but came back on Tuesday of this week to defeat Clovis West of Fresno, 1-0. Arizona-committed junior Ryan Maddox nearly struck out all 22 batters in the seven innings, but finished one short with 21.
In Florida, the last Extra Elite 80 rankings were held up for a day to see what would happen in a series between then No. 1 Lakewood Ranch (Bradenton) and up-and-coming Lake Brantley (Altamonte Springs). Lake Brantley ended up with a two-game sweep and was moved to No. 1 in the state and No. 4 in the nation at 9-0. Since then, however, Lake Brantley has lost three times, including a game on Wednesday of this week to Hagerty of Oviedo.
Previous No. 11 Wellington of Florida also fell since the last rankings, but actually has moved up this week since its loss was to 13-0-1 Oxbridge Academy of West Palm Beach. Oxbridge therefore has emerged as a new No. 1 in Florida. The ThunderWolves also have a game coming up against Melbourne (11-1), which is one of the teams that beat Lake Brantley.
The Texas teams, meanwhile, are in district play so for most of the highly ranked squads it’s been two easy wins per week and it might stay that way until the playoffs.
Lake Creek improved to 24-0 earlier this week with a 9-1 victory over Dayton. The Lions not only are still unbeaten, but they have some quality wins over other state-ranked teams, including Clear Springs and Klein Collins. They’ve actually topped Klein Collins twice. Leading players Ava Brown (Florida commit) and Maddie McKee (LSU), both juniors, also are having huge seasons so far. Ava has gone 16-0 in the circle with a 0.43 ERA and has 218 strikeouts in 98 ⅔ innings. She’s also leading the team in homers with seven. McKee leads the team in batting average (.573), RBI (34) and is second in homers (six).
We were hoping to include the first result of the spring for No. 4 Roncalli of Indiana in this week’s rankings, but the Royals and their big-time pitcher, junior Keagan Rothrock, had their game scheduled for Wednesday vs Center Grove postponed due to weather.
— Mark Tennis, contributor to Extra Inning Softball
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(After games of Wednesday, April 6)
(Previous ranking in parentheses)
1. (2) Lake Creek (Montgomery, Texas) 24-0
2. (3) Clovis North (Fresno, Calif.) 11-0
3. (10) Oaks Christian (Westlake Village, Calif.) 17-0
4. (5) Roncalli (Indianapolis, Ind.) 0-0
5. (8) Deer Park (Deer Park, Texas) 27-2
6. (NR) Oxbridge Academy (West Palm Beach, Fla.) 13-0-1
7. (3) St. Francis (Mountain View, Calif.) 10-1
8. (11) Wellington (Wellington, Fla.) 13-1
9. (9) Bartow (Bartow, Fla.) 16-1
10. (21) Hewitt-Trussville (Trussville, Ala.) 26-2-1
*** Scroll down to see the rest of the Top 50 plus the Next 30 and the teams that dropped out…