Bruin softball defeats Wildcats 15-9 to bring home national championship No. 106 for UCLA
Senior catcher Kaila Shull (left) shares a celebratory moment with friend and teammate Megan Langenfeld after winning the national title on Tuesday night.
By Vidur Malik
June 8, 2010 9:40 p.m.
Throughout the season, UCLA softball coach Kelly Inouye-Perez has said her team has been “on a mission.”
Mission accomplished.
With four home runs, including an Andrea Harrison grand slam, the No. 5 seed Bruins (50-11) easily defeated the No. 10 seed Arizona Wildcats (52-14) 15-9 on Tuesday to win the NCAA Championships in record-setting fashion. This title is the softball team’s 11th NCAA title and gives UCLA 106 total national championships.
“They’ve believed since day one,” Inouye-Perez said. “They were committed, they were together, they accomplished what they wanted to as individuals, but more important they brought home the trophy as a team. No. 106 is big, because they will forever be in UCLA athletics history. I am very happy for them for that.”
UCLA turned the NCAA Tournament into its own personal slugfest. The Bruins set a Women’s College World Series record with 14 home runs. They hit at least two homers in each of their 10 NCAA Tournament games.
After a 6-5 extra-inning walk-off win in the first game of the best-of-three championship round Monday, the Bruins left little doubt as to who would take game two
Senior Megan Langenfeld, who hit the game-winning home run Monday, kicked things off with a two-run home run in the top of the first inning off freshman Kenzie Fowler, who was replaced in the top of the second by senior Sarah Akamine. Harrison, a sophomore left-fielder, added four more runs with a grand slam in the second off Akamine. Harrison said the Bruins’ early success set the tone for the rest of the night.
“It showed that every inning was going to be a mini-battle,” Harrison said. “You take your offense, and you leave it in the dugout, and you go out and play defense, and our goal was to win every inning, and we did.”
The Wildcats brought in three runs in the bottom of the fourth off Bruin sophomore Aleah Macon, who struck out seven in 4 1/3 innings and got the victory. Up 7-4, UCLA responded by doubling its run total with seven runs in the top of the fifth, three of which came on a home-run by senior third baseman Julie Burney, to put the Bruins comfortably ahead 14-4.
A sixth-inning home run by sophomore right-fielder Samantha Camuso gave the Bruins their 15th run. Wildcats junior catcher Stacie Chambers also homered in the fifth and sixth, but the Wildcats could never really get back in the game.
Langenfeld, who recorded three wins and went 12-17 with four home runs and nine RBIs in the Women’s College World Series, was voted the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player. She ends her legendary career on top of the college softball world, and she has fought through injuries all season to lead her team.
“This year has been, I think, my hardest year, as far as injuries go,” Langenfeld said. “I was hit in an at bat against UCR early in the season. “¦ Luckily my team had my back through the whole time I was gone. I was able to get back in it and then had this little hamstring (injury) happen the day before regionals. Perfect timing, right? Again my team had my back all the way through regionals, supers and now. It was definitely a challenging year, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”
After a great start to the season, the Bruins endured a stretch of losses and injuries to Langenfeld and other key players before ending the season on a winning note, going undefeated in the postseason. Harrison said her team came together to work its way out of its midseason struggles all the way to the top.
“As the middle of the season came around, we hit some lows,” Harrison said. “And it was a team effort to figure out what it was going to take to win a championship. It was a mindset, it was leadership, and at the end of the day, it was a belief that we all had, and it just worked.”
