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Will the real #1 in the country please stand up?
It’s very early in the college softball season, of course–this weekend wraps up the first full week of action from across the country–but the beauty of preseason tournaments is that they give you the opportunity to see top teams face each other outside conference play.
The St. Pete/Clearwater Elite Invitational wrapping up Sunday has been the spotlight tournament with 12 nationally-ranked DI teams competing against each other and there have been teams that have impressed and others that have disappointed.
The most impressive team not just at the Elite Invitational but for the year so far has been UCLA.
The Bruins, with two games late Sunday against South Florida and Florida State to close out the tournament, are 9-0 including three wins this weekend: a 7-0 win over #9 Alabama, a 9-1 victory over Liberty and an 8-3 win over #15 Georgia.
The question mark heading into the season was how would UCLA respond with Rachel Garcia not playing for the Bruins as she’s on Team USA heading into the Olympic Games this summer in Tokyo, but Megan Fariamo and the rest of the pitching staff has been tremendous so far. Faraimo, a sophomore, didn’t give up her first runs of the year until yesterday’s 8-3 win over Georgia.
For the season so far, Faraimo is 5-0 with a 0.68 ERA and 45 K’s against just one walk. Behind her is Holly Azevedo who is 3-0 with 0.44 ERA and 17 strikeouts against only two walks in 16 innings. Another freshman, Lexi Sosa, is 1-0 with six K’s and one walk.
The most impressive stat for the Bruins’ pitchers may be they’ve only given up four walks in 54 innings.
The infusion of freshmen and transfers has really helped, especially with the offense which has scored 84 runs in the nine games for an average of 9.3 runs per contest. Not surprisingly, five of the wins have been run-shortened games.
The team batting average is .411 with Aaliyah Jordan leading the way with a .550 mark followed by freshman Alyssa Garcia with a .455 average. Maya Brady, another freshman, is hitting .429 with a team best four home runs and is tied for the lead with 12 RBIs.
It won’t get any easier for UCLA after this weekend, however; at Mary Nutter next weekend the Bruins will face Texas A&M, Wisconsin, Florida, Auburn and Team USA, the latter being an exhibition game.
If UCLA would win both games later this afternoon, or possibly even just one (the FSU game would be a key one matching the winners of the last two Women’s College World Series), then you’d think Kelly Inouye-Perez‘s team would jump to #1.
Washington, however, might have something to say about that.
The Huskies, who are already top-ranked in both major polls, are 9-1 although the loss was a five-inning rule-rule 8-0 shutout to Alabama in Florida.
Washington has been playing without Sis Bates, who has not seen action in St. Pete/Clearwater for undisclosed reasons, and she has been replaced at shortstop by Bailey Klingler, a transfer from Texas A&M.
Freshman Kelley Lynch has been impressive in the circle going 2-0 while knocking in 11 runs, tied for the team lead. Catcher Morganne Flores has sparked the offense batting .387 with three homer runs and 11 RBIs.
Oklahoma was #2 heading into this weekend, but lost 5-4 to Long Beach State in the first game of the Hillenbrand Invitational in Arizona on Saturday thanks to a two-run walk-off double by Alyssa Gonzalez. OU led 4-1 going into the bottom of the 7th but gave up four runs in the stunning loss.
The Sooners did bounce back to top #4 ranked Arizona 6-4 in 10 innings on the Wildcats’ home field as Taylon Snow went 2-for-5 with a pair of RBIs.
That was the first loss of the season for Arizona as well as both teams are now 9-1. Texas, #6 in the last week’s rankings, is currently 10-0 but doesn’t have the resume yet of playing the caliber of teams those in the top five have.
*****
Here is the 16-team field at the St. Pete/Clearwater Elite Invitational with how the teams were ranked by the USA Today/NFCA Top 25 Poll heading into the event:
- #1 Washington
- #3 UCLA
- #5 Florida State
- #9 Alabama
- #14 Minnesota
- #15 Georgia
- #16 Oklahoma State
- #17 Texas Tech
- #18 South Carolina
- #19 Missouri,
- #20 James Madison
- # 21 Northwestern
- Virginia Tech
- South Florida
- Kansas
- Liberty
*****
Below are the results of the games already played as well as the Sunday game schedule
St. Pete/Clearwater Elite Invitational Schedule & Results
Wednesday
Team USA 18, Liberty 0 (5)
Thursday
Alabama 7, Liberty 1
Oklahoma State 14, Virginia Tech 6 (6)
Texas Tech 5, South Carolina 1
Missouri 8, Kansas 0 (5)
Oklahoma State 5, South Florida 1
Alabama 8, Washington 0 (5)
Friday
Virginia Tech 8, South Carolina 6
Alabama 9, South Florida 1
Oklahoma State 2, Minnesota 0 (8)
Georgia 11, Kansas 0 (5)
Washington 7, Florida State 0
Missouri 5, Liberty 4
Georgia 8, Northwestern 3
James Madison 6, Texas Tech 0 (8)
UCLA 7, Alabama 0
South Carolina 10, Kansas 0 (6)
Minnesota 7, Florida State 6
Washington 10, Liberty 6
Saturday
Texas Tech 5, Georgia 2
Oklahoma State 4, Alabama 1 (8)
Northwestern 5, Kansas 4 (8)
UCLA 9, Liberty 1
Missouri 6, Virginia Tech 5
Northwestern 6, Florida State 2 (8)
UCLA 8, Georgia 3
Virginia Tech 2, Minnesota 1
South Florida 1, Texas Tech 0
James Madison 8, Missouri 7 (9)
Washington 5, South Carolina 4
Sunday
South Florida 2, Georgia 0
Minnesota 10, Missouri 1
Washington 11, Texas Tech 5 (8)
Team USA 4, Oklahoma State 0
Florida State 7, Liberty 1
Virginia Tech 6, Northwestern 5 (9)
UCLA 15, South Florida 2
UCLA 3, Florida State 2
Washington at Team USA, canceled
South Carolina at James Madison, canceled