Softball heads to Stanford with penultimate regular season series on the line
No. 2 UCLA softball will take on unranked Stanford this weekend riding an eight-game winning streak. The Cardinal will have the opportunity to spoil the Bruins’ bid at the regular season conference title. UCLA is currently tied with Arizona in the Pac-12 standings. (Taylor Lee/Daily Bruin)
By Coral Smith
May 3, 2019 1:21 a.m.
The Bruins are approaching the final stretch.
No. 2 UCLA softball (43-2, 17-1 Pac-12) will head north this weekend to face Stanford (31-12, 7-8) for its penultimate series of the season and last road series of 2019.
With UCLA’s series against No. 6 Arizona next weekend likely to decide which team claims the regular season Pac-12 title, Stanford will have a chance to play spoiler. The Cardinal are out of the running with their losing record in conference play, but the Wildcats and Bruins are currently tied atop the standings with one conference loss apiece.
While UCLA lost to unranked Oregon three weeks ago for just its second loss of the season and dropped from No. 1 in the country to No. 2, it has rebounded with an eight-game winning streak – scoring at least seven runs in seven of those victories.
Stanford entered the top 25 earlier this season before falling back out of the national picture in recent weeks. The Cardinal have only won three of their last 10 games, getting swept by both Arizona and Arizona State in back-to-back weekends.
The Bruins have the third-best team batting average in the nation, led by freshman utility Kelli Godin and senior catcher Taylor Pack. Godin leads the Pac-12 in individual batting average at .457, good for seventh in the nation. UCLA holds four of the top-10 batting averages in the conference, with Pack claiming third place with a .409 mark.
Stanford has only one player in the top 10, utility Teaghan Cowles, who sits at sixth place with a .403 average. The Cardinal are also dead last in the conference in home runs with 25, while UCLA has more than double that total with 55.
In the circle, UCLA currently leads the nation in ERA, with the team’s three pitchers combining for a 1.16 mark. The Bruins have given up only 48 earned runs all season, 13 fewer than Arizona, which ranks second in the conference with 61. In contrast, the Cardinal have given up 142 runs and their team ERA ranks fifth in the conference at 3.41.
The series will start Friday night at 5 p.m. at Stanford.
