MICHAEL MANTEL Senior pitcher Amanda
Freed rebounded from her first loss this season with a
near no-hitter.
By Vytas Mazeika
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
On the schedule for the UCLA softball program there’s no
longer an event called the Easton Classic. Instead the Bruins start
a new tradition in 2002 with the Stacy Winsberg Memorial
Tournament.
First pitch is scheduled for 9 a.m. Friday.
“Emotionally, it’s an important tournament because
we renamed it in honor of a former Bruin who passed away this
year,” UCLA head coach Sue Enquist said in reference to
Winsberg, a softball player at UCLA in the early 1980s who died of
cancer in December. “So the tournament itself has a special
meaning for us.”
In a technical sense, Enquist isn’t concerned about the
tournament as a whole, but rather on the progress her team makes as
it attempts to resurrect itself from a recent lull.
The top-ranked Bruins (17-2) have lost two games to
non-conference opponents in a span of a week after winning 52 such
regular-season contests.
Three errors on Wednesday accounted for all five unearned runs
allowed by the Bruins in a split against Cal State Fullerton.
“Offensively, that stuff comes and goes,” said
senior infielder Stacey Nuveman, who led the Bruins with seven home
runs, 30 RBI and a gaudy 1.113 slugging percentage. “Pitching
is a whole other game, but defense, you control that. If you are
focused in and ready to go, you’re not going to make errors.
So that is really, for us, what we are focusing on. That is our big
thing.”