Willow Canyon’s 2018-19 softball joy ride continued.

It took six innings for the Wildcats to really start cranking out the runs, but when they did there was no slowing down the run production and celebrations. The team tends to score runs in bunches. This time it happened against the upset-minded Sunnyslope Vikings Thursday at home.

Willow Canyon scored eight runs in the sixth inning to break open a close game and advance in the 5A Conference state tournament with a 12-3 win. The team has scored 23 runs in its first two playoff games and was coming off a first round victory over two-time defending champ Cienega.

Sunnyslope also made news in the first round, when it became the first 16th seed to defeat a No. 1 softball seed in the first round since the Arizona Interscholastic Association introduced the power rankings in 2013.

“It’s a great ride,” Willow Canyon coach Donnie Tizzano said. “It started in August, because they get along so well. Everybody wants everybody else to do better. So you come to the park and you’re happy every single day. They have a great time, and you don’t want it to end.”

Tizzano’s run scoring machine, the only 5A team that had scored more than 300 runs this season, will take on Horizon next in the 5A playoffs.

Sunnyslope missed a golden opportunity to keep up with Willow Canyon when it left the bases full to start the sixth inning, trailing by a run. In the bottom of that frame, Willow Canyon also loaded the bases to help it open the run flood gates.

Thirteen batters came to the plate in the sixth, when leadoff hitter Alannah Rogers and No. 2 hitter Mashayla Beltran each collected two hits. Rogers went 5 for 5 in the game.

“(Rogers) is a beast,” Tizzano said. “She’s the smallest in stature (5-feet-2) but plays big. Most of the time she’s the best player on the field.”

And she’s only a freshman.

Rogers raised her average to .473 and is one of seven talented freshmen on the team. Since school started in August, Willow Canyon captains Draya Rhinehart and Beltran took the freshmen under their wing to help forge a united team, Tizzano said.

Five of those freshmen are batting over .313. Another talented 9th grader, Isabella Serratos (two hits), was penciled in at the very bottom of the order, but she’s got some pop in her bat also.

“The two seniors (Rhinehard and Beltran) have done a good job of teaching us how to have good at bats and to make sure to stay up and not get down,” Rogers said.

(Alannah Rogers)

Several of Willow Canyon’s 19 hits went the opposite way.

The bats of Willow Canyon (25-8) and base running (7 steals vs. Sunnyslope) put a lot of pressure on Sunnyslope. In the circle, Willow Canyon’s Rachel Broussard gave up a run in the first inning but settled down after that.

“In the No. 1 vs. No. 16 game they seemed a little more lose,” said Sunnyslope coach Mike Fenton about his team team.

“And in this game, at the beginning, they were a little flat. I think it’s because we are really young.”

But Sunnyslope’s season isn’t over in the double elimination portion of the tournament.

Sunnyslope will get another chance to pull off another upset when it plays No. 4 Sunnyside on Saturday.