Submitted photo – The Ferndale players and coaches at Point Arena on Tuesday.

A determined Ferndale team is marching on in the North Coast section softball playoffs for the first time in eight years.

The Wildcats, who are seeded No. 9 in the Division-6 bracket, traveled to play No. 8 Point Arena on Tuesday evening and came away with a convincing 18-8 in five innings.

They won with some solid pitching and defense, but it was the team bats that really impressed.

“I thought we had a really good approach at the plate tonight,” Ferndale head coach Jeremy Griffith said. “The girls went up with a plan and they were able to execute it. We had a lot of hard hit balls.”

And they achieved that with a balanced team effort, with six different players hitting successfully.

No one more so that junior Tinnley Pidgeon, who returned to the lineup late in the season after suffering an injury in the final week of the basketball season and has been on fire since then.

On Tuesday, the multi-sport Ferndale standout finished 4-for-5 with four RBIs and also scored four runs.

She wasn’t the only Wildcats player to impress in the win.

Fellow junior Madison Gossi also has been very impressive at the plate in recent games and that continued at Point Arena, as she finished 2-for-4 with two RBIs.

The Cats also played some solid defense behind another good performance by sophomore pitcher Olivia Gossi in the circle.

“They put the ball in play and defensively we were able to make the plays when we needed to,” Griffith said.

The playoff win was the first for the program since the Cats defeated Calistoga 22-3 in 2017, which was the last time the team qualified for the NCS postseason.

And it sets up a quarterfinal showdown at No. 1 seed Kelseyville, which had a first-round bye on Tuesday.

That game will be played either Friday or Saturday.

Four other players had a base hit in Tuesday’s victory, including Quinn Stokesberry, who finished 1-for-3 with four RBIs.

Alayna Cooney was 1-for-2 with two RBIs, while Caleigh Griffith finished 1-for-3 with an RBI and Olivia Gossi was 1-for-3 with three runs.

The Wildcats were the only local softball team involved in playoff action on Tuesday.

Ferndale is now 10-12.

The NCS softball playoffs continue on Wednesday with three H-DNL teams in action.

Fortuna plays at Benicia, while South Fork hosts Hercules and Hoopa hosts San Domenico.

All of those games are set for 5 p.m.

File photo – Madison Gossi