With last weekend’s three-game sweep of the Oregon schools, the UCLA softball team quietly continued its dominance in the second half of its conference season.
The team has strung together 12 wins in its last 13 games after dropping four of five to open Pac-10 play.
With one pivotal series remaining against the Bay Area schools at home this weekend, the No. 2 Bruins (38-9, 13-5 Pac-10) find themselves tied for first in the Pac-10 and clicking at the right time of year.
“I’ve been happy with the season. The season is long and it really is a marathon,” coach Kelly Inouye-Perez said. “There are going to be highs and lows, and for us to be able to learn as much as we can has been my goal from day one.”
The 2009 season has indeed been a little bit of a roller coaster, at least relative to UCLA softball’s tradition of winning and winning a lot. The team scattered two losses early in the season, including its opening game against Purdue and then snapped off 18 wins in a row to close out its nonconference schedule.
It was toward the middle of the season that the team hit its only rough patch. The Bruins lost six of nine including four in a row at the beginning of conference play.
But after a rough start to conference action, UCLA has bounced back and is now in position to make another run in the postseason.
“We’re getting better and better, and we’re building momentum. All of those things are coming into play right now, and I’m so proud of the girls,” Inouye-Perez said.
The team’s pitching, which Inouye-Perez holds as a key to success, has somewhat paralleled the Bruin’s season.
The team’s dynamic in the circle is much different than it was a year ago. In 2008 the rotation was anchored by Anjelica Selden, a four-year starter and the team’s unquestionable ace.
This season the team has embraced a system that more resembles pitching by committee. With no clear ace to replace Selden at the beginning of the year, the team’s three pitchers, redshirt sophomore Whitney Baker, sophomore Donna Kerr and junior Megan Langenfeld, have shared time in the circle, and the results have largely been positive.
“What’s best about this is that our pitching staff has been able to work together all year,” Inouye-Perez said. “Lang(enfeld) wasn’t 100 percent in February, and D.K. (Donna Kerr) did pick up the slack and do great things. There is no one individual pitcher leading this train. We pitch as a team, and all of them know that.”
All three pitchers have had to step into new roles in order for the team to keep winning. Baker pitched in only two games last season because of an injury but has appeared in 16 games, starting 15 and doing 61 innings of work this season. Kerr, who looked promising as a freshman a year ago starting games alongside Selden, looked dominant early in the season, struggled toward the middle and has since regained her confidence during this late-season surge.
“I’ve been trying to work hard in the bullpen and apply it in the game,” Kerr said. “I’ve been doing game-like things in the bullpen and against our batters.”
Langenfeld primarily served as the team’s closer in 2008 but this year has started eight games, appeared in 25 and pitched 98.2 innings. While Kerr struggled in the middle of the year, Langenfeld stepped up, and while Langenfeld was gathering her bearings during the beginning of the year, Kerr took the majority of the innings. Langenfeld is currently 12-1 with a 0.99 earned run average. Kerr improved her record this weekend to 17-6 and brought her ERA down to 2.65.
“It’s the second year, so I’ve been around Pac-10 once, and I know it’s a long season,” Kerr said. “I know we need to have pitching depth because we need to be able to tag team.
“I think we all work together really well. Whoever gets the ball, we all know the others have her back.”
PITCHING INSIDE: Kerr tied an unusual school record on Sunday against Oregon State, hitting four batters in the Bruins’ 9-1 mercy-rule victory.
Kerr allowed only one hit and one baserunner aside from the four that reached base thanks to inside pitches.
“We are going inside, so they are on the plate, and if it is too in, they are going to try to turn into it,” Kerr said.
Kerr was also named UCLA/Muscle Milk Student-Athlete of the Week Sunday in recognition of her 12 innings of two-hit softball last weekend over the Oregon schools.