Arizona was on a mission.
The Wildcats had one blemish over the weekend and needed to avenge Friday’s loss to former Pac-12 foe, Washington.
On Sunday, No. 17 Arizona had their chance. With a little extra meaning to this game, all aspects of the Wildcats’ performance — pitching, defense and hitting — were on fire.
They were more than ready for this grudge match rematch, and defeated the Huskies 4-0, on a two-hit complete game shutout from Devyn Netz, at Hillenbrand Stadium in the final day of the Candrea Classic.
Arizona is now 5-1, while UW drops to 2-3.
This weekend, the Wildcats beat some of the top teams in the country including No. 11 Alabama and a Washington team that is getting votes in the USA Softball poll and ranked No. 22 in the NFCA poll.
“I think it doesn’t honestly matter who’s over there, as long as (the Wildcats) are handling their business,” Arizona coach Caitlin Lowe said. “That’s what they figured out after Friday was if we can take care of what we do best, then we can beat anyone in the country. (It’s) less worrying about who is in the other dugout … and they just chipped away at the game.”
Arizona’s Devyn Netz gets some relief work against Michigan State in the sixth inning on Feb. 6, 2025, at Hillenbrand Stadium.
Over the weekend, Netz delivered with her hitting — knocking three home runs and driving in seven runs in Thursday’s opener against Michigan State. On Sunday, she helped her team with her arm.
Netz, who had a rocky outing loss to Washington on Friday night, came out on fire. She struck out four batters in the first four innings and didn’t give up a hit until that same inning — a double to the right center gap.
She was dealing, pitched a complete game, giving up no walks, nine strikeouts, one hit batter with 84 total pitches.
“I just thought about bouncing back, but also just seeking that redemption,” Netz said. “I put that (Washington) loss on my back. I felt like, ‘You know what, I can really pick it up for my team right here. Just think about one pitch at a time and use my defense.’ And that’s exactly what worked today.”
Both Lowe and Netz said it was about the do-it-all redshirt senior giving herself a little grace. After all, these are the first moments of her final year after sitting out last season with a back injury. Netz admitted she didn’t sleep well after that loss.
A large crowd watches as Arizona’s Dakota Kennedy (4) hits the ball during the game against Alabama in the Candrea Classic, Mike Candrea Field, Feb. 8, 2025.
With a tighter zone than the other day, Lowe said Netz “was excellent and I think you saw her passion come through.”
It didn’t hurt that Netz could rely on the incredible defense behind her. Two plays stood out. In the fourth inning, after that double, center fielder Regan Shockey caught a fly ball and threw a perfect strike to Jenna Sniffen at third to get the runner and get out of the inning unscathed.
In the fifth, after giving up an infield hit, Kiki Escobar delivered an unassisted double play by diving for a hot shot off the bat of Riley Peschek and getting back to first before the runner, Giselle Alvarez. Netz would strike out the next batter to end the inning.
Arizona didn’t waste any time attacking the Huskies. In the first inning, Dakota Kennedy (3 for 3, 3 runs scored) hit her third double of the season — a gapper to left center. After Regan Shockey popped up to the catcher, Kaiah Altmeyer hit her own double to left field to score Kennedy. This was followed by an RBI single to center for Sydney Stewart to give the Wildcats 2-0 lead after one inning.
The Wildcats tacked on runs in the third and fifth innings, to go up 4-0.
Over the weekend, the Wildcats found different ways to win from a five inning rout, 15-0, in the first game against Michigan State on Thursday to squeezing out a 10-9 win in the second game on clutch hitting. They also had dominant wins over Western Michigan and Alabama, with a walk-off from Altmeyer.
“I liked how quickly we made adjustments from Friday,” Lowe said. “I think sometimes that can take weeks for that, the collective unit to get on board. And I think there’s people that we wanted to have more at bats on the bench that will get more at bats. There’s still so many pieces that I think are going to make us great. But, you know, Paige (Dimler) shined in moments. Anyssa (Wild) shined in moments. (Emily) Schepp is going to get there and shine in moments. There’s just so many things I think about that, ‘Man, we can really play good matchup games.’ It’s just exciting. I think we’re nowhere near the full picture of what we can be. That makes it exciting to go to practice on Tuesday and just get to work.”
