Houston RBI softball team making 4-peat run

VERO BEACH, Fla. -- Like a no-hitter in progress or a press-box mention of a game passing quickly through five innings, the word “four-peat” is pretty much a no-no of its own at the Jackie Robinson Training Complex this week.

At least among the only team that can turn the trick, the Houston Astros Foundation RBI club.

Winners of three straight RBI World Series in softball, the Astros have done almost everything right through five games in the 2022 championship tournament among eight teams spanning the nation from Los Angeles, Calif., to Hoboken, N.J.

Across those five contests, the Texas squad has dominated the competition in a way befitting the Lone Star State: In a very big way.

Head coach Megan Hays’ fun group, sprinkled throughout the lineup with superb talent, has delivered on a daily basis, pummeling the opposition on the scoreboard, 58-7, and letting the other seven teams know that Houston is there for No. 4.

John Wooden’s UCLA Bruins won seven straight titles in college hoops from 1967-73, while the Montreal Canadiens (1976-79) and New York Islanders (1980-83) won four straight Stanley Cups apiece.

Just don’t ask Houston to talk about its four-peat.

“I feel like it’s more of a way to keep the pressure off of them as much as it’s already on them,” Hays said. “They know being the reigning champ [means] they have everybody gunning for them.

“I think it’s just their way of being able to still go in with the ease of mind and play the game the way they want to play it, without that extra pressure.”

In Thursday’s pool-play game, against a feisty Harrisburg bunch, Houston found itself in an unusual position through 2 1/3 innings, trailing for just the second time in the tourney.

In a top of the third that saw Astros outfielders racing to the fence to retrieve a pair of extra-base gap hits, Harrisburg crossed home plate four times on five hits against starter Isabella De Los Santos for a 4-2 lead.

One of the points Hays stresses is winning innings, and while they were eventually outscored that frame 4-3, Houston regained an advantage for good. They soon put together seven unanswered runs en route to a 9-4 win.

De Los Santos -- whom assistant coach Vincent Villareal said has three changeup speeds: slow, slower and slowest -- settled in and allowed just two more harmless singles over the final four innings.

“I’ve always told them as long as they outhit the other team and win every inning, they’re going to win the ballgame,” Hays said. “Our pitching this year is definitely command pitching -- hitting spots, changing pitch speeds and throwing off batters. Bella did a good job of that.”

Being behind for a moment didn’t matter either.

“We know we have good bats, and our energy always stays up,” said center fielder Elizabeth Baylor, who is in her second RBI World Series and will play at the University of New Mexico. “We might be down, but I don’t ever doubt our team, because when we’re having fun, we always play hard.”

Catcher Karisma Garcia agreed and said that giving in at any part of the contest isn’t what she and her teammates do.

“There is no quitting on this team,” said Garcia, who is an incoming senior at Dwight D. Eisenhower High School in Houston. “Our energy takes us through the entire game.”

Hays said shuffling the lineup almost resulted in some stellar glovework. Second base and right field have been positions that haven’t been settled this season, with different players rotating into the spots.

However, inserting Sydney Palomo at second base looked like a genius move three batters into the game vs. Harrisburg.

With one on and one out, Palomo made a brilliant diving stab of a hard grounder by Harrisburg’s Emma Keller. The defensive gem resulted in a fielder’s choice at second base that thwarted any chance of a threat.

“We took a shot on Sydney today, and it worked out in our favor,” Hays said. “She made phenomenal plays over there. Our right fielder [Lesly Gonzalez] had been playing second, and we’ve rotated in other right fielders. Lesly played right field last year, so we just gave Sydney a shot at second today.”

Added Hays of her lineup move before laughing, “It was a great decision today.”

Houston will play Puerto Rico Aguadilla (4-1) Friday morning in one of four early games.

In their first meeting Wednesday, the Astros scored six times over the first three innings against Puerto Rico and won, 6-1. De Los Santos scattered five hits in a complete game with seven strikeouts.