One would expect a team that loses its all-time strikeout leader ““ a pitcher that has won the second-most games in team history ““ to have something of a lapse.
Not if that team is the UCLA softball team.
The Bruins begin their 2009 campaign with an open spot at the top of the pitching staff. That open spot belonged to a figurative behemoth among pitchers: Anjelica Selden.
But the Bruins aren’t worried. They’ve had this happen before.
“Some of the best pitchers in the entire game have been here,” coach Kelly Inouye-Perez said.
“Every (time), they only get four years of eligibility. So, when they graduate … it opens the door for someone to step up and shine.”
Inouye-Perez, who coached the Bruin pitchers and catchers before taking the reins in 2007, remembers when Selden, an unknown freshman, stepped into the circle for the Bruins to take Keira Goerl’s spot.
The same Keira Goerl who led the Bruins to back-to-back championships and who pitched a no-hitter in the championship game to cap her senior year.
“You would think that it wouldn’t get any better,” Inouye-Perez said.
Selden had an excellent career. She’s still with the team now as an undergraduate assistant coach helping her proteges fill big shoes.
Among the candidates to do so are juniors Megan Langenfeld and Whitney Baker and sophomore Donna Kerr.
The Bruins have reason to be excited about each player.
Langenfeld has pitched solidly, posting a 1.58 ERA with an 8-2 record last year and a 1.45 ERA and a 14-3 record her freshman year. She also nabbed five saves, which are something of a rarity in softball.
“I would love to pitch a complete game every time, but it’s totally up to coach,” Langenfeld said of her role last year.
“If it’s going to help our team, with me coming in as a closer, then that’s what I’ll do,” she added.
Kerr had the team’s lowest ERA last year, at 0.93, and held a 14-2 record. She also threw a perfect game against St. Peter’s. After all that, Inouye-Perez expects Kerr to have a breakout year.
The only wildcard is Baker, a junior whose first two years at UCLA were derailed by injury. She had a collapsed lung her freshman year, a broken rib last year, and a boot on her right foot when not practicing.
But she was recruited to compete with Selden, Inouye-Perez said.
Baker is optimistic about the year.
“The fact that we’re able to have all three of us together, it could be dangerous, in a good way, because we just have a lot of depth,” Baker said. “If one person doesn’t get it done, then the next person is right behind them.”
Junior catcher Kaila Shull called her pitching staff “multi-dimensional.” The other members of the staff agreed, echoing Inouye-Perez, who said the team has “three completely different looks.”
“When I put that together as a coach, (I) sit here and say that it’s going to be a great year,” she said.