With the Pacific-10 Conference softball season drawing to a close this weekend, the Oregon softball team wasn’t the only squad pleased to be making a trip back to the NCAA Regionals. In total, seven of the eight Pac-10 softball programs advanced into the postseason, and here’s a look at where those teams ended up.
Arizona State
The top-ranked team in the country for most of the year and No. 1 overall seed in the NCAA tournament, Arizona State (50-6) will host the Tempe Regional. The Sun Devils welcome North Dakota (30-25) in the opening-round game, while San Diego State (32-19) and Long Beach State (37-16) will face off in game two. Arizona State closed out the regular season by taking two out of three games at home against Stanford. The game two loss snapped a 12-game winning streak dating back to April 15. In 2008, the Sun Devils won the Women’s College World Series with a 66-5 record.
Arizona
The Arizona Wildcats will host their own regional in Tucson at the well-known Rita Hillenbrand Memorial Stadium. The Wildcats (40-16) earned the No. 8 seed in the tournament, and welcome in Texas Tech (40-14), who earned an at-large bid out of the Big 12 Conference, New Mexico (43-15), and Harvard (36-14). Arizona struggled at seasons end, losing series to Arizona State, Oregon and California, but also took two out of three from UCLA in Los Angeles. Before losing to the Bruins in the championship game last year, the Wildcats won back-to-back titles in 2006 and 2007.
Washington
The 12th-seed Washington Huskies will host the Seattle Regional, with play beginning Thursday night at Husky Softball Stadium. Washington (34-14) will play the Portland State Vikings (34-16) in game two that night, while Auburn (39-17) and BYU (38-16) will match up in the opener. The Huskies finished out the year by winning two out of three games against Oregon State in Corvallis, but had lost nine of their previous 11 leading up to that point. It has been just two years since Washington star Danielle Lawrie led the Huskies to the national title in 2009.
Oregon
With the Ducks taking their last four Pac-10 series of the year, including two out of three against UCLA this weekend, Oregon earned the 13th overall seed in the 64-team tournament and will compete in the University Park Regional in University Park, Pa. The Ducks (39-14) will play Albany (N.Y.) (28-21) in the opener on Friday night, while Fordham (41-17) and host Penn State (29-22-1) will round out the competition. Oregon reached the Super Regionals for the first time in program history in 2010, before losing to the Missouri Tigers.
UCLA
Despite a shaky end to the regular season, the Bruins are back to defend their national title from a year ago, and will travel to the Gainesville Regional at Katie Seashole Pressly Stadium. UCLA (33-17) will play Jacksonville (43-14) Friday night, with Bethune-Cookman (33-24) and host No. 4 seed Florida (47-9) closing out the night. The Bruins have never competed in the state of Florida for postseason play, but in their five regular season trips, UCLA has tallied a 30-2 record overall. Since 1999, the Bruins have won the national championship four times, including back-to-back victories in 2003 and 2004.
California
On the other side of the bracket, No. 7 seed California is set to compete in the Louisville Regional in Kentucky. The Golden Bears (39-10) match up with Jacksonville State (39-19) in the regional opener, with Illinois-Chicago (25-22) and the host Cardinals (36-18) rounding out the field. Cal completed its best Pac-10 regular season since 2005 — winning five of seven league series, including three complete-series sweeps — and will look to claim its first national title since taking home the trophy in 2002.
Stanford
The fourth and final Pac-10 team to host a regional, the Stanford Cardinal welcomes Pacific (37-17), Fresno State (34-17), and Nebraska (39-12) into Boyd & Jill Smith Family Stadium on Friday night. The Cardinal (38-15) has already hosted a regional round five times since 2001, with this season marking the 14th consecutive season Stanford has competed in the NCAA postseason. Stanford finished in fifth place in the league standings, and will be looking for its first trip back to the Women’s College World Series since the 2004 season.