DANIEL WONG/Daily Bruin Senior Staff Sophomore infielder
and pitcher Claire Sua eyes the ball in a match
against Riverside earlier this season.
By Vytas Mazeika
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
There is not as much resentment as there is anticipation.
For the top-ranked UCLA softball squad, a trip to Tucson for two
games against No. 2 Arizona provides the team with its first chance
for redemption since a 1-0 loss to the Wildcats and pitcher Jennie
Finch in last May’s NCAA title game.
The Bruins (33-4, 1-1 Pac-10) are rather giddy with the
opportunity to play a big game on enemy territory against an elite
program. The Wildcats (33-4, 2-0) have a home winning streak of 68
games dating back to last season. The single game attendance record
is in jeopardy, as last season’s UCLA-Arizona contest drew
3,004 fans. And though the fans are raucous, they’re not
immune to silence.
“We have made them quiet before,” said UCLA senior
pitcher/centerfielder Amanda Freed, who lost last season’s
title to Finch. “But then they get a different kind of loud
going on. A little mad-like loud.”
Finch, who shut out the Bruins three times in three attempts
last season as a junior, will most likely be on the mound Saturday.
And as an added bonus, Saturday’s game at Hillenbrand
Memorial Stadium will be televised on Fox Sports West. So with all
of the anticipation, it would be easy to overlook No. 8 Arizona
State (30-9, 0-2), UCLA’s opponent on Friday night in
Phoenix.
Senior pitcher/designated hitter Erica Beach has a career high
““ 18 wins this season ““ to go along with a 1.17 ERA and
116 strikeouts for the Sun Devils, while sophomore Phelan Wright
leads the team in batting average (.467), home runs (6), doubles
(13) and is second in RBI (30).
“Arizona is Arizona, so obviously you get that extra fire
going,” Freed said. “Yeah, it’s on TV. And yeah,
we would all love to cream Jennie Finch. But we need to get by
Friday, and ASU is definitely playing good softball right
now.”
Once Friday is done, the challenge of solving Finch begins.
Though Bruin hitters like first baseman Tairia Mims, a Tucson
native, believe Finch is hittable, her ability to hit spots and
remain in control proved to be too much for UCLA last season.
Hitting Finch might not be of any significance if the defense
falters the Bruins once again. Against Washington last weekend UCLA
made three errors in the bottom of the sixth inning to allow four
unearned runs in a 9-6 loss. But the team feels that every time
they take a step backwards, they can bounce back and take two
forward.
“We’re definitely a good defensive team,” Mims
said. “We have good defensive players and we just need to
learn to play with each other.”
Aside from a walk given up by sophomore pitcher Keira Goerl to
lead off the Washington rally in the bottom of the sixth, UCLA head
coach Sue Enquist was extremely pleased with Goerl’s overall
performance last weekend. Goerl is 16-3 for the season, with a 0.30
ERA. In 118 innings, she has allowed 36 hits and struck out 165
batters.
“You have to be able to pull the positive out of an ugly
situation in order to learn from it and stay positive overall in
training for the week,” said Enquist, who loves facing
Arizona because the game is a barometer of where her team finds
itself at any point of the season. “It’s not too
complicated. Pull out the things you feel good about, take
responsibility for the things you’re not, and do something
about it.”
Using that aggressiveness, the Bruins hope to rectify their
recent doldrums against Finch and the Wildcats.
“We’re due to get on Arizona,” Freed said.
“We’ve beat them recently, but we haven’t really
stuck it to them lately.”