In its final game of the regular season, Arizona stranded the tying run on third base and the winning run on second.
Stanford held on for a 4-3 victory, marking the Cardinal’s first-ever series win at Hillenbrand Stadium. The visitors blanked the UA 10-0 on Friday after Arizona won Friday’s opener, 10-6.
Arizona must now sweat out the NCAA Tournament Selection Show, which starts Sunday at 4 p.m. The UA last missed the postseason in 1986.
“We’ll be watching tomorrow and whatever happens, happens,” said Carlie Scupin, who went 3 for 4 at the plate. “The important thing is, if we do make it, keeping that seventh-inning mentality.”
Saturday’s seventh inning was nearly stellar.
The Wildcats entered the final frame down 4-1. Three of their first four batters reached, loading the bases for cleanup hitter Izzy Pacho with one out. Pacho reached base on a fielder’s choice, cutting Stanford’s lead to 4-2 with two gone.
Scupin then sent a blast into the left-center field gap, plating one run. Pinch-runner Blaise Biringer, the potential tying run, was held up at third base.
“It felt good off my bat,” Scupin said when asked if she thought it was a home run. “I was just hoping that nobody caught it and it’d score a couple runs.”
That brought up freshman Paige Dimler. The All-Pac-12 Freshman Team selection fell behind in the count 1-2 before grounding out to Stanford pitcher Alana Vawter, ending the game.
The heartbreaking loss puts the Wildcats (33-20, 8-16 Pac-12) in wait-and-see mode. Arizona entered the week just outside the top 40 in NCAA’s RPI and needed a series win at home to shore up a postseason berth.
“You want to go into that day making it undeniable, but that’s just not us this year,” first-year UA coach Caitlin Lowe said. “We’re just hoping for more games to play in.”
Arizona catcher Sharlize Palacios takes a look at her bat after she broke it during her third-inning plate appearance. Palacios got a new bat, then grounded out to third base.
Dropping two of three also prevented Arizona from moving up in the Pac-12 standings. The UA ends the season in a three-way tie for last place with Cal and Utah, though the strength of the Pac-12 means six or seven schools will likely make the postseason. Nine Pac-12 schools have softball teams.
Arizona outhit Stanford 11-6 on Saturday, though it was a mistake on the first batter of the game that eventually put the Cats in an early deficit. Stanford leadoff hitter Taylor Gindlesperger hit a dribbler to the left side of second baseman Allie Skaggs, but she misplayed the ball and it skipped off her glove into shallow right field to put a runner on first.
Gindlesperger eventually came around to score, giving the Cardinal a 1-0 lead.
Stanford made it 2-0 in the second when it had runners on first and second and Sydnee Huff hit a double to center. It would have been 3-0 had it not been for a great relay from UA’s Hannah Martinez to Skaggs to Sharlize Palacios that cut down a runner at home.
“For ‘Peanut’ to have that awareness and get the ball in quickly was huge,” Lowe said, referring to Martinez.
An RBI single from Jasmine Perezchica in the third cut Stanford’s lead to 2-1.
Stanford shortstop Emily Young, left, fields a grounder hit by Arizona’s Izzy Pacho in the first inning.
On Senior Day, two of Arizona’s three graduating seniors got the start: Hanah Bowen in the circle and Martinez in right field. The other, catcher Bailey Thompson, served as the team’s designated hitter the first two games of the series and would have come in as a pinch-hitter in the seventh had Dimler extended the inning.
Bowen threw a complete game for her final Hillenbrand Stadium appearance, clocking a final line of seven innings pitched with six hits and three earned runs allowed while also striking out four.
“A lot of emotions out there today,” Bowen said. “Just tried to stay in the present and take it one pitch at a time.”
Bowen allowed two more runs in the fifth inning, then retired the Cardinal in order in the sixth and seventh innings. If Arizona were to make the postseason, Bowen would be in line to start the first game.
“I’m not sure (if we’ll make it), but I’m excited to see where we’ll be,” Bowen said.
