Paniagua Powers Southridge Into 6A Regional Finals

We are now beyond the point where people are overlooking how good this year’s Southridge Spartans team is. They have quietly been one of the best teams in South Florida all year, with a devastating pitching staff, and above average offense.

Now, everyone is starting to say the quiet thing out loud. The Spartans are legitimate conetnders for a 6A state championship.

This weekend, Southridge continued their march towards that goal, by taking out perennial state contender and former champion Doral, sweeping the first two games, and winning the series.

“Continue to be extremely proud of how these guys are performing,” said Spartans Manager Manny Ojeda. “Yesterday we played a tight game, and came out on top. And today, the performance by Jonathan Paniagua, with two big home runs, and the seven RBI, was just special. It set the tone for our game today.”

It was Chris Gonzalez, and not Paniagua who got the scoring started, hitting a lead-off home run in the bottom of the first. Paniagua then hit a three run homer in the second, extending the Southridge lead to 6-0.

Nico Perez got in on the action with a homer of his own in the third. The score would then stay 7-0 until Paniagua stepped to the plate in the fifth, and hit his second homer of the game, a grand slam, to walk off the 11-0 win.

On the day, Paniagua finished 3-for-3, with two home runs, three runs, and seven RBIs. Perez also added two hits, two runs, and two RBIs.

The offensive explosion was nice for Southridge, but their bread and butter is always their pitching, and in game two of the series, Isaac Vidal did the heavy lifting, going the first three innings, allowing no runs and two hits, while striking out seven.

Amari Davis threw the final two innings, completing the shutout.

The Spartans move to 22-5, and will face off against top-seeded and defending state champion St. Thomas

“We are taking this one step at a time,” said Ojeda. “There is excitement for the team, the coaches, the school, and the community. We are going to get right back to work, and make sure we do what we need to do to prepare for the next step. We are looking forward to playing next week in the regional finals.”

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