Already the third UCLA pitcher called upon for damage control, sophomore Donna Kerr took a moment to brace herself. Kerr and the rest of her Bruin squad stared straight down an 8-1 black hole in the bottom of the fifth inning of Sunday’s Super Regional rubber game at Easton Stadium.
The eight-clap subsided, the UCLA faithful stunned by what was about to transpire.
The second-year pitcher went through her wind-up and heaved.
Then, Missouri’s Gina Schneider connected and sent the ball, and the Bruins’ season, careening over the left-field wall.
By the time Schneider rounded the bases, Missouri had upset second-seeded UCLA 9-1 by way of the mercy rule, eliminating the Bruins in the NCAA Super Regional and slamming the door shut on UCLA’s hopes of a national championship.
“It was a very frustrating weekend, and a difficult day,” coach Kelly Inouye-Perez said. “Any time we end our season earlier than expected, it’s tough to swallow.”
It wasn’t at all the storybook ending that the Bruins had envisioned.
The most storied program in collegiate softball history wasn’t supposed to suffer defeat at the hands of a team that has not advanced to the Women’s College World Series in the last 14 years.
The 2009 Pac-10 Conference Champions weren’t supposed to bow out while three of their conference opponents still remain in contention for a shot at the NCAA title.
But with Sunday’s loss, the Bruins were in fact eliminated in the Super Regional round for the first time in school history.
“All you have control over is to give everything you have and to have a positive attitude,” Inouye-Perez said. “(The girls) walk away knowing that … because the game clearly didn’t give us a break this weekend.”
From the get-go, the Bruins had to play catch-up, dropping the first game of the best-of-three series 2-1 against the Tigers.
Junior pitcher Megan Langenfeld got the start in a rare night game and gave up two runs in the second and third innings.
Held scoreless throughout the game, the Bruins attempted a late rally.
Freshman designated player Dani Yudin hit a lead-off solo home run in the bottom of the seventh, but that was as close as the Bruins came to pulling off a come-from-behind win, as Missouri’s freshman pitcher Chelsea Thomas retired the last three batters.
“We felt the momentum starting to shift (in our favor),” Langenfeld said. “Unfortunately, we just ran out of outs.”
The UCLA offense came out and responded the following day with a 5-2 victory in what turned out to be the first game of Sunday’s doubleheader.
With runners on the corners in the top of the second, sophomore shortstop Monica Harrison came through with a squeeze-bunt single that put the Bruins ahead 1-0.
Later in the fifth, junior catcher Kaila Shull launched what proved to be the game-winning two-run home run, while Langenfeld, for her part, held Missouri scoreless in 6.2 innings of work.
But in the rubber match, the Bruins found themselves in trouble early.
Starting her third consecutive game, Langenfeld gave up three runs in the first and was never able to find a groove thereafter, allowing five runs and two walks in just 1.1 innings.
Meanwhile, her successors in the circle didn’t fare much better.
Redshirt junior Whitney Baker tossed two innings and gave up three runs, while Kerr pitched just two-thirds of an inning before giving up the walk-off, game-clinching home run to Schneider.
At the plate, the Bruins never got into rhythm either, tallying just two hits in the game.
“No matter what, when you play a team like UCLA, you know they’re going to hit the ball hard,” Missouri coach Ehren Earleywine said. “You just have to hope that a good offensive team like (UCLA) hits a few of those lasers right at you, and they did.”