Cougars Roar Into CIF Softball Finals

Tuesday will go down in the record books at Beaumont High School.

The Cougars softball team was playing in its first CIF semifinal and went on to register a 4-0 win over visiting El Monte Arroyo. The victory secured Beaumont’s first CIF championship game appearance in four years.

Beaumont, the No. 2 seed, will play in the CIF-Southern Section Div. 5 final at Deanna Manning Stadium in Irvine against the winner of the semifinal game between top seeded La Canada and South El Monte.

Beaumont coach Jim Tickemyer said his team has proven any and all critics wrong.

“We’ve proven we can play with anyone in our division and probably a couple divisions up,” Tickemyer said. “We are looking to bring it to Irvine and play our best game. We still haven’t played our best yet.”

Beaumont (25-4) will take a 12-game win streak to the final and have won 17 of their last 18 games.

“It’s really a credit to the coaching staff and to the girls,” Beaumont High Athletic Director Martin Dusold said. “The high school season is a long season. To see these girls focused and to have the composure and to manage the games the way they have, it’s a total credit to all of them. What they’ve done is just amazing.”

The game was a pitcher’s duel in the early going. Beaumont sluggers Kristen Neal and Bernadette Moreno changed that.

Neal passed on a pair of rise balls and then hammered the third over the left center fence.

“I really didn’t know what to expect from her,” Neal said. “She had good movement. I was just looking for one pitch I could hit through.”

Then Moreno slammed her first pitch over left center as well.

“It was like…she hit a home run; hey, I have to hit a home run now,” Moreno said. “The first pitch I saw I put all my might into and hit over. It was a great feeling.”

The home runs kept the Cougars on a high for the remainder of the game.

“Back to back home runs?” Coach Tickemyer asked. “I don’t care if it’s the playoffs or a league game, that gets you jump started. From there on out I felt we could score a run or two from there.”

And Neal wasn’t done. With the Cougars leading 3-0 (Jayme Tickemyer drove in Lauren Hernandez in the fourth) Neal slammed her second home run of the game – another solo shot over left center.

“I had all kinds of confidence in myself even though I had two strikes on me,” Neal said. But we’ve done a lot of work with high tees and that helped me hit the second one.”

With Beaumont’s offense on track, pitcher Alyssa Fuimaono took care of the rest. Fuimaono worked her ‘A’ game from start to finish, scattering four hits and striking out nine.

“I felt pretty good out there,” Fuimaono said. “Curve balls. I only threw two inside pitches and a couple change ups. It was curve balls all day.”

Like her teammates, Fuimaono was relieved to reach the final.

“It feels good to finally get here,” Fuimaono said. “We’ve had a lot of games. It's great to know we just have one game to win it all.”