A trio of former Sequim High softball stars are battling for wins on softball diamonds for their respective college teams this spring.
Demiree Briones
Former Sequim High School pitching star Demiree Briones is playing far from home but hitting like she’s quite comfortable on the East Coast.
Briones is playing first base for the North Carolina Central Eagles (14-17) softball team.
She hit her first home run against Alabama A&M on March 7 and her second against Norfolk State on March 10; she now has four on the season.
In 28 games, Briones is hitting .274 heading into the April 6 doubleheader with Bethune-Cookman University.
Briones, a 2012 Sequim High grad, hit .442 for Southwest Oregon Community College as a freshman before transferring to North Carolina Central.
Rylleigh Zbaraschuk
Once a UW Husky, Sequim High grad Rylleigh Zbaraschuk is now hitting the field for the Concordia Cavaliers in Portland, Ore.
In 21 starts and 33 games overall, she’s hitting .288 with 10 RBIs. She also has six steals in seven tries and scored 15 runs for the Cavaliers (31-11).
As a freshman at UW in 2014, Zbaraschuk played in 28 games, mainly as a pinch runner. She scored nine runs over the course of the season, appearing in 16 of 22 Pac-12 games.
Zbaraschuk and teammate Bailey Rhodefer were voted league co-MVPs by the Olympic League softball coaches in 2013.
Lea Hopson
Sequim High grad Lea Hopson recorded her second career multi-home run game on March 14, leading the Texas Tech softball squad to a 16-4 win against Mississippi Valley State.
Hopson, a senior infielder for the Red Raiders, smacked a solo home run in the third inning, then drilled a two-run shot in the fifth, her team-leading ninth homer of the season. She also had a two-run double, helping her match a career high with five RBIs.
Hopson is hitting .326 with a team-high nine home runs in 37 games, all starts, as of early this week.
She had two RBIs in the Red Raiders’ most recent game, a 6-5 loss to No. 15 Baylor on April 4.
Hopson, a 2011 Sequim High graduate, was a standout for the College of Southern Idaho, hitting .358 with 53 RBIs and 28 stolen bases. As a Wolf, she won back-to-back Olympic League MVP awards in 2010 and 2011.
