With no pressure on them, Wildcats are hitting their peak at perfect time

Two games. Two wins.

And just like that, Arizona is on its way back to Oklahoma City and the Women’s College World Series for the second time in two years and third straight time overall.

All three parts of the game — pitching, defense and offense — were working for the Wildcats against Mississippi State in the Super Regional.

Underdog UA is having fun and staying loose. There is no pressure. After all, the Wildcats weren’t even supposed to be here after starting Pac-12 play 0-8 and eventually finishing tied for last in the conference at 8-16.

“I think that's the biggest thing is we don't have to become someone else in the postseason and regional, Super Regionals — whatever it is — we have to settle into being our best selves,” UA coach Caitlin Lowe said.

Arizona (38-20) hopes to stay the course starting at 6:30 p.m. Thursday for its first game in the World Series against No. 7-seeded Oklahoma State (46-12) in Oklahoma City.

Despite beating Mississippi State 3-2 on Friday and 7-1 on Saturday in Starkville, it took UA a while to settle in during both games.

Friday’s game started out as a pitcher’s duel between UA’s Hanah Bowen and MSU’s Annie Willis.

“I thought that first inning she (Willis) was amped she was throwing gas at us, and we weren't ready for it,” Lowe said of the three strikeouts in the first. “Then we kind of went outside our plan and ourselves second and third time through and then I really felt like we were starting to find ourselves. I really felt like we were starting to find ourselves. I thought it took us a while to settle into that game, if I’m being honest."

Timely hitting from the Wildcats helped them win the opener. Allie Skaggs blasted her 24th of the season to tie the game at 1-1, a sacrifice fly from Shar Palacios tied it at 2-2 and then Izzy Pacho hit the game-winning blast to left field in the eighth inning.

On Saturday, the Wildcats spotted an early run to the Bulldogs, then let their pitching and defense keep them close until the seven-run fourth inning. The go-ahead runs off Carlie Scupin’s two-run homer, then with a few hits and miscues from the Bulldogs, the Wildcats tacked on five more runs to break it open

Again, it was the pitching that was the real story of the day as Devyn Netz shook off the nerves to give up only one run on five hits. She threw only 80 pitches and allowed only two hits to go out of the infield.

It’s the pitching that has stood out in each of the five games the Wildcats have played in the postseason.

Bowen and Netz have combined to give up only six runs to go with 23 strikeouts. All five games were complete games, including two shutouts. The three teams the Wildcats have played — Illinois, Missouri (twice) and Mississippi State (twice) — left a combined 34 runners on base.

The defense has shown up, as well, with only one error in five games. Pacho had a leaning-over-the-wall catch that was named one of the top three plays of the day on "SportsCenter." Janelle Meñno robbed MSU’s Mia Davidson of a home run Friday, and the team had three double plays to end three consecutive innings Saturday..

Just breathe

In both games over the weekend, there were times that UA assistant and pitching coach Taryne Mowatt-McKinney made visits to the circle. For Netz, it came in the first inning Saturday.

What was the message?

“It’s her coming out there and telling me to breathe,” Netz said. “Focus on the catcher and focus on little things like one pitch at a time. Every time she comes out there during postseason it’s been, ‘Devyn, just breathe. Just calm down. You’ll be fine. Just settle in and you’ll be OK.’”

Netz said that at first, she let the Bulldogs’ record-breaking crowd of 2,229, rattle her a bit. She quickly recovered and was more in command as the game wore on.

For Bowen, the talks with her pitching coach helped her get out of some jams. Bowen said, “She was coming out there to give me some time.”

“Just give me some time to just take pressure off myself and just do what I know how to do,” Bowen said. “I was telling myself just one pitch at a time, one pitch at a time, and breathe. That's what I did.”

For Bowen, it meant inducing fly outs — she had 15 in eight innings.

Coming together

When things got tough in the beginning of the Pac-12 season, the Wildcats knew they could count on their coach, Lowe, who helped get them back on the right path.

Scupin said, “She never let us lose hope.”

Each of the Wildcats had a one-on-one meeting with Lowe to try to fix what wasn’t working. Everything looked great in practice, yet they couldn’t put it all together in games.

“During each time, she told each one of us, ‘You guys need to talk to each other. You guys need to look to each other. You guys need to build off on one another and encourage one another.’ That was something that I think we really had to work on as a team. And in the end, it really paid off even though we went through rock bottom. I'll tell you that, but it's so worth it now.”

Watching from home

Lowe is in her first season as head coach of the Wildcats after spending nearly a decade on coach Mike Candrea’s staff.

The legendary coach who led Arizona to eight national championships, hasn’t been too far away all season, as an advisor to UA Athletic Director Dave Heeke, providing advice along the way to Lowe and other Arizona coaches.

Lowe said that she received text messages every day from Candrea.

During the regular season, Candrea was at home games watching his former team. Yet, he hasn’t made an appearance in the postseason.

“He didn't come to Super Regionals, and he didn't come to regionals,” Lowe said. “He's very superstitious man so he will be sitting from probably the same chair watching.”

One question remains: Will Candrea break from his postseason routine and go to Oklahoma City to watch the Wildcats play in person?

Inside pitch

With the limitations on their practice time leading up to and during the Super Regionals and no schoolwork, how have the Wildcats been filling their extra time? “We got to stop off at the store the other day we picked up some games. We've been playing Taboo and doing puzzles together,” Scupin said.
Lowe has seen how her team has grown right in front of her eyes. They didn’t let a slow start to Friday’s game control their mindset the entire game or weekend. “Our whole goal was to chip away the best we could and for Shar, Skaggs and Pacho, who in particular to have those type of at-bats,” Lowe said. “And then at the end of the game (Friday), sac fly, home run, home run. That, to me, shows maturity. So yeah, maybe we didn't get it done in the beginning of the game, but they chipped away every single inning to make sure they got the job done.”
With Florida's win over No. 3-seeded Virginia Tech on Sunday, three of the top four seeds have been eliminated. The only seeded teams that will be in Oklahoma City are No. 1 Oklahoma, No. 5 UCLA, No. 7 Oklahoma State and No. 9 Northwestern. The unseeded teams still alive are UA, Oregon State, Florida and Texas. UA and Oregon State went a combined 17-31 in Pac-12 play, but are 11-1 in the postseason.
Pac-12 champion ASU (43-11) was eliminated by Northwestern 8-6 on Sunday night in Tempe in Game 3 of the Super Regionals. The Sun Devils swept UA in Tucson by a combined 28-2 score over three games in March, and finished 12 games ahead of the Wildcats in the Pac-12 standings. But it's UA who will be making the trip to Oklahoma City while ASU stays home.