Editor’s note: For more than three decades, the UA has been one of college softball’s best teams, making 23 Women’s College World Series appearances and winning eight national championships. The Star is reliving each of the WCWS trips.
2019: Wildcats sent home early as big bats are silenced
What went down: Arizona made it to its 23rd WCWS appearance after a nine-year absence but lost back-to-back games to UCLA and Alabama and was eliminated.
UCLA went on to beat Oklahoma to pick up title No. 13.
The Wildcats beat Washington — for the first time of the year — 3-1 in eight innings in the opener on a two-run homer to center by Dejah Mulipola. It was her 23rd home run of the season. Jessie Harper hit a solo shot — her 29th — for the other run.
UCLA beat Arizona 6-2 in the next game. A Wildcat error on a dropped fly ball in the outfield allowed two runs to score in the seventh to help the Bruins break the game open.
Arizona (48-15) was then shut out for only the second time this season, 2-0 by Alabama. The only other time came 1-0 at Cal that ended a 21-game winning streak.
UA had an opportunity to score in the bottom of the sixth, however Alabama’s Montana Fouts retired Jessie Harper, Malia Martinez and Mulipola with a foul out, a pop out and a strikeout.
In the three WCWS games, the Wildcats ‘Murderers’ Row’ of Alyssa Palomino-Cardoza, Harper, Martinez and Mulipola combined for only nine hits. All five of UA’s runs came via four home runs.
The bottom part of the order didn’t fare any better. Hannah Bowen, Hannah “Peanut” Martinez and Carli Campbell combined for only one hit in Oklahoma City.
Arizona finished No. 5 in the final poll for its highest ranking since 2010.
From the archives: The Star’s Norma Gonzalez wrote that Arizona was the only team that won every postseason game coming into the WCWS. Their elimination came down to one bad inning in both games. She added:
Arizona rolled through the Tucson Regional and Super Regional, beating Harvard, Auburn and Ole Miss at Hillenbrand Stadium to punch its ticket to Oklahoma City. The sixth-seeded Wildcats kept the momentum going into the first game of the WCWS, upsetting No. 3 Washington 3-1 in eight innings Thursday.
The Wildcats entered Friday as the only undefeated team in the postseason, but one bad inning against the second-seeded Bruins pushed Arizona into the losers bracket. With their backs against the wall, the Cats faced No. 8 Alabama ….
Arizona’s Taylor McQuillin (18) delivers in the fifth inning against Alabama in their elimination game on day three of the NCAA Women’s College World Series, Friday, Saturday, June 1, 2019, Oklahoma City, Okla.
The Crimson Tide took advantage of a couple of walks from starting pitcher Alyssa Denham to score on a two-run double from Bailey Hemphill and then kept the Wildcat bats quiet to move onto the WCWS semis.
“You have an opponent on the other side trying to do the same thing you’re doing,” (UA coach Mike) Candrea said. “Unfortunately, we had one bad inning against UCLA. Denham has thrown some big ballgames for us this year, got in a little bit of trouble, was getting squeezed on her best pitch, which is the screwball.
“That’s when I thought I needed to make a change to give them a different look because she wasn’t going to be effective not having that pitch.”
Senior Taylor McQuillin replaced Denham in the fourth inning and allowed only one hit the rest of the way.
She said it: “I don’t think we had offensive problems. We kind of beat ourselves. Other than that, we had pretty good at-bats. We were seeing her (Fouts) pretty well, we just weren’t getting the results we wanted.” — Mulipola
After OKC: Mulipola was one of three college softball players, along with UCLA’s Bubba Nickels and Rachel Garcia, named to the U.S. Olympic Team. She redshirted in 2020 to tour with Team USA. One of the early stops on the tour in February was at Hillenbrand Stadium to face the Wildcats. Team USA won 5-4.
With the coronavirus pandemic the 2020 Summer Olympics were postponed to 2021. The rest of the NCAA softball season was also canceled. Mulipola is scheduled to play her final season in 2021, along with the other five seniors in her class as spring sport athletes were granted another year to play.
The big number: 53. With Palomino-Cardoza’s home run against UCLA, she had 53 career home runs.
