No challenge appears too big for Izzy Pacho.
She has proved it over and over as a Wildcat.
As an Arizona softball freshman, Pacho was a role player behind former UA standout Malia Martinez — a multiple all-NFCA West Region player — at third base.
Sophomore year, she split time catching with then-freshman Shar Palacios — a year before Palacios became a 2022 All-Pac-12 performer prior to transferring to UCLA last summer.
As a junior, Pacho was mainly a pinch hitter and watched from the bench as Olympian Dejah Mulipola settled back in behind the plate; Palacios served as the primary backup.
Then came last season. Pacho finally earned a regular spot in the starting lineup at third base and shined as a defensive stopper and offensive threat.
Yet last fall might have been one of the biggest challenges of all — student-teaching while training and playing the fall-ball session.
The fifth-year senior and team leader’s schedule looked like this: Lifting weights alone at six in the morning; student-teaching; then back to Rita Hillenbrand to practice with her teammates.
If that sounds difficult, it was. It took a certain type of focus and energy to get through.
Pacho not only got through it but thrived. She earned Student Teacher of the Year from UA’s College of Education.
“Mad, mad props to her,” Arizona coach Caitlin Lowe said. “We didn’t notice how much it affected her. There was one day that we did notice. She just wears it so well. (But) something was off. We ended up having the whole team come to her conditioning. She was conditioning by herself, which I don’t know if she told you, at 6 a.m. on her own in the dark, nobody next to her, and that’s the hardest thing to do.
“We had the whole team come one day, and she got emotional about it because she was missing that part. Missing being in the trenches (and going through) the hard stuff with the team. But you never would have known it.”
At the Arizona softball team's recent preseason media day, UA players discuss expectations this season, while head coach Caitlin Lowe shares here thoughts on the identity of her 2023 Wildcat team and how the transfer portal is impacting the sport. Video by Devin Homer/Special to the Arizona Daily Star
One last ride
Pacho is entering her fifth year as a Wildcat, and it will mostly likely be the final year of her playing career. She has played in 110 games, starting 79 times.
Her line (so far): a .312 average, .378 OBP, .541 slugging and .919 OPS. With more playing time, Pacho’s numbers have gone up. Over her career, she’s hit 14 home runs (11 last year), with 51 RBIs (37 last season) and 17 doubles (13 in 2022). She also has a .978 fielding percentage.
She was named first-team NFCA All-West Region and hit the game-winning home run in Game 1 of the Starkville Super Regional against Mississippi State.
While Pacho’s UA career has had one hurdle after another — culminating with her likely behind the plate full time — Lowe describes Pacho as one who “was always ready when her name was called and just never stopped working.”
Added Lowe: “I think you see breaks go people’s way when they’re doing the right things on and off the field.”
The path might not have been what Pacho had planned. But even through the tough times, she has stayed positive. That’s just who she is.
“One thing I always say is you’re either getting better or you’re getting worse every day, and so I always choose to try to get better,” Pacho said. “I want to go out this season just giving it my all, and if I held back any little bit, I would regret that next year.
“It was for them. It was my family, my friends — just everybody that’s ever helped me,” she added. “I’m like, ‘OK, this is who I am, and I’m going to show up for them.’”
Even through the daily, grueling push during the fall semester, she stuck with it. It was “exhausting but also so fulfilling for every aspect of my life.”
“It definitely was eye-opening to find something that I love just as much as softball because that’s never happened before,” Pacho said of teaching. “Being exhausted to the point where my tank is empty, getting to practice and just trying to run on whatever I had left, that was hard. But our team is amazing. I keep saying it, I wish I could have played with this team all five years. They are just awesome human beings. “
For Pacho, earning the student-teaching honor was the first time she felt recognized for something outside of the softball field — and that was meaningful.
Yet, softball and catching will always be her first love.
Even as Arizona’s Izzy Pacho is likely the Wildcats’ primary catcher this season, she still kept her skills sharp during preseason practice Jan. 26 at Hillenbrand Stadium. Over her four-plus years in Tucson, Pacho has found her way into the lineup in a number of ways, at multiple positions.
Love of the game
Her stepdad, Bo Dumlao, got her hooked on softball.
“Throughout my entire life, he pushed me to be better and was always there to throw BP to me or to work on catching or anything — whatever it was, he was always there to help me,” Pacho said. “He started that love for the game.”
Her mom, Lisa, was concerned, however. that Pacho would get hurt in tee ball.
She was clumsy, and Pacho admits she still hasn’t entirely grown out of that awkward stage.
“I still fall all the time,” Pacho said. “One of the funny stories that everybody tells is last year in a nonconference game, I was trying to turn a double play. It was (hit) back to the pitcher. I think it was Devyn (Netz), and she threw it to third. I went to throw it first and I just tumbled and fell.”
Pacho is still taking some reps at third for those days off when freshman Oliva DiNardo subs in. DiNardo, ranked the No. 2 catcher in this year’s class by Extra Inning Softball, is the next in line to follow the Wildcat tradition of top catchers.
Coming back to catcher after not playing it full time was like putting on a well-worn glove for Pacho. She started working on it in earnest over the summer. The only change was feeling it in her knees.
More reps helped build her endurance, as well as a lot of stretching and cold and hot tubs after practice.
“Sometimes it’s just my old body trying to keep up with it — old in softball,” Pacho said with a laugh.
She wouldn’t trade the sore knees for anything. Getting one last shot at catcher and having that special connection with the UA pitching staff is worth everything.
“I love the control that I have and being able to communicate with my pitchers,” Pacho said. “Being on the same page with Devyn this year — we’re just a battery, and being able to look at her and say, ‘No, it needs to be here,’ or ‘Come on. Let’s do this.’ Having that battery and that energy together, there’s no other feeling like it.
“Sometimes when you play the field at third — I made some good plays — but there’d be games where I didn’t even touch the ball. Behind the plate you’re in it every single play, every pitch. It’s definitely a little more exhausting because you’re mentally engaged the whole time, but I definitely love it.”
Building the battery
Lowe has seen the time Pacho has put into developing those connections with all five of Arizona’s primary pitchers: Netz, Brianna Hardy, Ali Blanchard, Sydney Somerndike and Aissa Silva. This will help in those tough innings when they struggle to help them focus on the next pitch.
“What I’ve noticed big time in her maturity, growth has been her ability to just handle all the different personalities, the ups and downs with how they go through the preseason,” Lowe said. “I know she’ll be that steady force in season for us.
“(A few weeks ago) after the scrimmage, they were just on one. They were locked in. You can tell when a pitcher and catcher are just there. They know what they want.
“Even if a pitching coach is calling something they’re like, ‘Yes, no, yes. Like, I want this.’ That was the first time I saw it with Izzy and anyone else, to be honest. She’s taken over the ownership role of what that position means. Not just looking back there and waiting for (UA assistant) Taryne (Mowatt-McKinney) but like, ‘I’m going take control of this game.’
“I think that’s been a big deal for us, not just with the pitchers on the mound but as a defense.”
