Ally Carda was in trouble. With runners on either side of her at first and third, and the go-ahead run at the plate with no outs, the sophomore pitcher was in the middle of the defining moment of Tuesday’s ballgame versus North Dakota State.
Leading 3-1 in the top of the fifth, Carda had walked the first batter and allowed a single to the next, putting Bison runners on the corners. UCLA coach Kelly Inouye-Perez came out to the circle.
“We talked about slowing the game down and working at my pace,” Carda said. “Just throwing my pitches, calling my game and not worrying about what the hitters are doing on the other team.”
As has been the mantra of this team all season, it was not what they did to get themselves into this position that mattered. It was what they did right after.
Carda responded, striking out the next two Bison batters looking, before having the next one foul out. Carda survived the inning without surrendering a run. After escaping the jam, the Bruins added four more runs to take a 7-1 win.
“By nature, the game will test you and make you want to do more,” Inouye-Perez said. “It’ll have those critical moments, an opportunity to see what you can do … and she did, pitch-by-pitch, getting herself out of it and not making it bigger than what it was.”
The UCLA offense proved equally as clutch on the other side of the ball, with the team knocking in a run each in the first three innings, all of which came with two outs.
“We were just trying to get strikes, and lay off her rise ball early. Once we were able to do that we were more successful,” said senior outfielder Devon Lindvall, who singled with two out in the second and later scored on an RBI single from freshman Allexis Bennett.
“We just shortened up, got in our two-strike stance and we were able to poke the ball in the right places and rally up.”
Carda, who earned her 14th victory of the year, struck out seven and allowed four hits in five innings of work.
However, she proved equally as effective at the plate, going 3-for-3, blasting her ninth home run of the year to put the Bruins up by two in the third before sending a three-run shot over the center field wall to give UCLA a 7-1 lead.
Junior pitcher Jessica Hall continued the strong performance for the Bruins in the circle when she came in as a reliever. Hall also ran into trouble of her own in the seventh after walking the first two batters of the inning.
But she answered as Carda did before, striking out two batters, including one that proved to be the final out, completing the resilient pitching performance.
“They’ve got some fight to them,” Inouye-Perez said. “The pitchers have a presence right now.
“It doesn’t matter who the opponent is, they are just battling the consistency of playing one pitch at a time. … I look forward to just seeing the next challenge because there’s different ways to win, different people stepping up.”
The next challenge for UCLA will be the loaded Pac-12, as the Bruins take on the No. 2 Arizona State Sun Devils at Easton Stadium in a three-game series that starts March 22.
With the rise in the caliber of opponents comes a new feel and atmosphere to the games.
“It’s exciting, it’s fun. It’s a lot more competitive, and everyone just comes out ready to go, swinging big,” Lindvall said. “This next chapter is really exciting. We’ve learned a lot about ourselves and our team, and if we can just keep doing what we’re doing and play our game and not worry about the opponent I think we’ll be in a good spot.”