No one said a program was limited to one season-long slogan.
And since the W.F. West High School softball team is a perfect 13-0 at Recreation Park, it led head coach Kevin Zylstra to don a long sleeve crimson shirt on Thursday night that read “Defend the Turf.”
“It is like we’re sprinkled with magic dust and sometimes I have to get out of the way and let them go,” Zylstra said. “The faith I have in these girls is just incredible. I know they’re going to come through. They are just peaking at the right time.”
Turf = defended.
Magic dust = sprinkled all over.
No. 9 hitter Karly Rasmussen ripped an 0-2 changeup to left field and Brooklyn Spencer scored the game-winning run in the bottom of the sixth to give the top-seeded Bearcats a 4-3 triumph over Ridgefield in the Class 2A District 4 semifinals.
At one point, it was 19 straight seasons of trips to the state tournament. After missing the ride to Selah in 2023 and 2025, W.F. West (19-3) gets to reacquaint itself with Carlon Park.
“That was kind of awesome, I took a breath and I was like ‘We’re ahead, OK we got this,’” Rasmussen said.
Even though it seemed easy for the Bearcats to routinely be a state tourney team, Zylstra never took it for granted. And even after seeing their seasons end in districts twice, the longtime leader understood the difficulty of SW Washington softball.
“It is so freaking tough to get to the state tournament, especially from this district,” Zylstra said. “You look at the gauntlet you got to go through and it is just incredible.”
Which made the final out, gloved by shortstop Rayah Middleton, as sweet as can be.
“All of us have worked hard and the whole season, we have been on it,” junior ace Taylor Tobin said.
Spencer’s single and Kenley Fragner’s walk put the tying run in scoring position. After Tanner Tobin struck out, Rasmussen stepped to the plate and looked at two fastballs down the pipe.
“I’m normally thinking (to) see my pitch and get on base,” the sophomore designated player said. “Two outs, two strikes, I was stressed.”
Ridgefield pitcher Faith Smith fired a changeup that Rasmussen leaned forward and still got her barrel on it for the game-winning hit. Her scream and the bellows of her teammates in the dugout echoed around Rec Park.
“I (always) believe in myself,” Rasmussen said.
“It is confidence in hitting and she is an extremely confident girl,” Zylstra added. “Talk about clutch, holy smokes.”
The Bearcats nickeled and dimed their way to a 3-0 lead versus the Spudders. Gracie Elam roped an RBI double in the first inning, an outfield error plated Tanner Tobin in the second and Spencer’s run-scoring base hit came in the third.
All of their runs were with two outs.
Tobin dazzled for five innings, then made one crucial mistake in the sixth. Back-to-back singles by Ridgefield led to Abbey Hite’s game-tying three-run dinger that bounced off the top of the outfield fence and went over.
Hite was also 4-for-4 in the quarterfinal victory over Tumwater.
“She didn’t get the rise ball up quite where she wanted it,” Zylstra said.
Time and time again, Taylor Tobin has credited the defense behind her. And the Spudders had several hard hits, finishing with 11 fly outs or pop outs.
“If I just throw strikes, we’ll get the outs,” Taylor Tobin said. “We clutched up and made every play.”
In the 11-1, five-inning quarterfinal victory over Woodland to start the day, it was a not-so-stellar beginning for W.F. West. It had three errors and the Beavers jumped in front 1-0, causing Zylstra to burn an early mound visit.
When he was in the circle with the infield, he uttered another slogan: “BAMO.”
Also known as, breathe and move on.
“It was almost disbelief,” Zylstra said.
Taylor Tobin struck out the next three hitters, then the offense took care of the rest with a five-run bottom half that featured RBI hits from Spencer, Fragner and Tanner Tobin. Avery Osborn and Karlee Coleman each launched home runs in the second.
Two complete games on 181 total pitches capped Taylor Tobin’s night with six strikeouts each. Coleman had three hits versus Ridgefield while Osborn and Spencer recorded three hits against Woodland.
“Our lineup is so good, I can trust any of the nine girls,” Taylor Tobin said. “It was so fun to see that, especially in districts.”
What stands in W.F. West’s way of a second district title in three years is Mark Morris, the GSHL regular season champ that put up a staggering 35 runs on Thursday in two wins. Plus Montana recruit Makenzie Henthorn registered 23 strikeouts to just one hit and two walks.
It’s a title game that Zylstra called “intriguing.”
“We can be smarter and make things unpredictable for them,” he added. “You got the mashers and the Division I pitcher and everything is going their way against little 5-2 Taylor Tobin. Let’s see what happens.”
Rasmussen and Tobin have their own ways to combat Henthorn and the potent Monarchs lineup. Still, they understand it will take a team effort to end up on top.
“Just chipping away, we need base hits because that is what we can do,” Rasmussen said. “We need to do our job.”
