It hasn’t been easy this season for the Redmond Mustangs, faced with a new coaching staff, a relatively young team and the graduation of pitching ace Erika Hendron.

But still, the fastpitch team, despite a 6-9 league record with one game to go (at home against Ballard on Friday), has secured the No. 4 seed into next week’s 4A Kingco Tournament, where they will face off against the always-tough Inglemoor Vikings on Tuesday, May 18.

Although on paper, the 13-3 Vikings seem stacked compared to the Mustangs, in their one meeting earlier this season on April 30, Redmond more than held their own in a tightly-contested 3-1 loss.

In that game, starter Emily Graves had one of her best outings of the season, going the distance and giving up just three runs on five hits against one of the league’s most potent lineups. Defensive miscues ending up costing the Mustangs.

“Looking back on the book, I noticed that the little mistakes, an error here and there, cost us,” said first-year head coach Parris Mamon on his team’s prior matchup with the Vikings. “We need to eliminate our mistakes and play error-free ball. They’re a good club, and if we give them extra outs, we’re going to put ourselves in a tough position.”

Even with an upset on Tuesday, it will be a grind for the Mustangs to earn that coveted state berth, as the tough brackets of the Kingco tournament require teams to win as many as six games to make it to state at the end of the month.

The Mustangs, however, have shown flashes of brilliance along this year’s roller-coaster ride of a season, and Mamon is proud of his squad for sticking together through the rough times.

“Our biggest improvement this season is that they stayed together,” Mamon acknowledged. “We’ve had a lot of ups and downs, and we’ve just been unable to put all facets of the game together at once. They stayed as a team throughout the whole thing, played well, and didn’t let down.”

Coming from the 3A Seamount League as the coach of Lindbergh High School in Renton, Mamon was eager for the challenge of coaching in the state’s premiere fastpitch league, and he got all he bargained for.

“The teams here are really good,” he said on the differences coming up from the smaller classification. “There are a lot of really solid pitchers in this league, and teams play great defense. Every team has great hitters.”

When the Reporter last spoke to Mamon, he clearly stated that his goal was to survive a tough league schedule, make the Kingco Tournament, and send his team to state.

“We’ve done two out of three,” he noted. “Hopefully we can play some good ball and go on to the next level.”

After this Friday’s makeup game against Ballard, which will be at Redmond High at 4:30, the Mustangs play Inglemoor next Tuesday afternoon in the tournament’s opening round at 4:30 p.m. at Inglemoor High School.

On Wednesday, the Mustangs were shut out by Issaquah ace Mackenzie Voves and the Eagles’ defense, 3-0, with Louise Chouinard checking in with the lone hit for Redmond.