Head coach Sue Enquist is not someone who is hesitant to make
changes.
After the women’s softball team dropped a 1-0
pitcher’s duel to Stanford on Friday, Enquist looked to shake
things up. Caitlin Benyi, who has been batting leadoff all season,
was placed in the No. 3 spot, and Stephanie Ramos became the new
leadoff hitter.
The results were exactly what Enquist hoped for as the Bruins
took both games from the Bears, defeating them 5-1 Saturday and 3-1
on Sunday.
The No. 4 Bruins (31-7, 4-6 Pac-10) took two of three Pac-10
games for the second weekend in a row as they continue to move away
from the cellar in the conference standings.
Sunday was a true testament of how the Bruins are piecing
together all the aspects of their game. While the pitching was not
up to par a few weeks ago, it allowed just three runs this
weekend.
“It’s a reflection of our pitching, and what Dodd
did yesterday,” Enquist said. “[Cal] likes to swing big
and hard; it’s not a team that necessarily hits a lot of home
runs, but it is a team that is very, very free swinging.”
Although the pitching was excellent all weekend, the hitting
floundered against No. 8 Stanford (38-12, 8-4 Pac-10) as the team
was shut out for the first time all season.
Aside from swapping Benyi and Ramos in the order after the
Stanford game, Enquist also plugged in Alissa Eno and Julie
Hoshizaki at the bottom of the order, where the Bruins had not been
seeing much production lately. Eno’s start was her first in
two years.
And after the changes, the Bruins found a way to cash in their
baserunners against Cal (38-10, 5-7 Pac-10). In the first inning on
Sunday, Claire Sua drove in Andrea Duran, who had doubled down the
first base line.
Sua collected her second RBI of the game in the third inning
when she singled up the middle, scoring Duran from second
again.
Ramos topped off UCLA’s scoring in the next inning with a
home run over the right field fence in her newfound leadoff
spot.
“It never hurts to try. And we tried it and were
successful,” Ramos said.
Benyi also collected four hits in the third spot in the lineup
over the weekend.
“We’ve come out with a lot more energy, and we built
some confidence,” Benyi said. “We just needed something
new.”
However, the victory for the Bruins included some tense moments.
Cal stranded 11 runners on base on Sunday, and threatened in the
seventh inning by loading the bases with no outs.
Senior ace Keira Goerl settled things down, though, giving up
just a sacrifice fly to the Bears’ cleanup hitter Haley
Woods, the Bears’ sole run of the game. The inning ended with
a strikeout followed by a groundout to Duran.
The defense, which has slowly been piecing together its game all
season, seems to be coming together as well.
“Any time you have Keira out there, you know you’ve
got 120 percent confidence in her,” Benyi said. “We
just stuck together real well in terms of communication and got
through it.”