For the seventh time in nine years the No. 11 Oregon softball received its bid to compete in the first round of the NCAA playoffs, and the Ducks will travel to University Park, Pa., to face Albany (28-21) in game one Thursday night. @@http://www.ncaa.com/news/softball/2011-05-15/participants-named-ncaa-field@@
Host Penn State (27-22) and Fordham (41-17) round out the University Park Regional.
Last season, the Ducks traveled to Georgia Tech for the Atlanta Regional where they upset the Yellow Jackets in back-to-back games en route to their first-ever Super Regional appearance. The team went on to lose at Missouri in that round, but should have a less difficult path to the Women’s College World Series in 2011.
The road to Oklahoma City, site of the Women’s College World Series, began several weeks ago for the Ducks when they swept Oregon State in late April. From that point on, Oregon took series wins from then-No. 9 Arizona, then-No. 10 Stanford, and No. 12 UCLA by a count of two games to one in each.
The latter was a particularly significant accomplishment for the Ducks, who knocked off the defending national champions for the second time in three days on Saturday afternoon. Behind a stellar pitching performance from lefty veteran Brittany Rumfelt on Senior Day at Howe Field, Oregon picked up its ninth win in its last 12 outings to finish the regular season in a tie for third place in the Pacific-10 Conference standings with Arizona.
Rumfelt, along with Monique Fuiava and Kaitlin Vitek, celebrated their final regular season games in Eugene on a high note on Saturday.
“It’s very good for the seniors,” Oregon coach Mike White said. “There just hasn’t been one weekend, it’s been us over four weekends showing that consistently we can play with the best.”
The Ducks (39-14, 11-10 Pac-10) did just that against a deeply talented UCLA squad over the weekend, picking up a narrow 6-5 win on Thursday to get the series started, but stumbled in Friday night’s 7-4 loss, before rebounding to shutout the Bruins, 5-0, on Saturday.
Rumfelt (6-0) struck out seven, walked five, and allowed just three hits in her six innings of work before turning the ball over to Jessica Moore to close out the final inning and earn her third save of the season.
Moore, who started each of the first two games of the series, entered with the bases loaded and no outs, but made quick work of the jam. She got No. 9-hole hitter Talee Snow to ground into a crucial 5-2-4 double play then retired GiOnna DiSalvatore on another ground ball to end the game. @@Capitalized weird, but correct@@
“I got on (third baseman) Courtney Ceo pretty hard yesterday,” White said. “I thought there was a couple plays she should’ve made, and she came out today determined and really showed what she can do. The double play at the end there was a momentum killer, it was a huge play for us.”
Rumfelt did get plenty of run support when the Ducks exploded for a four-run fourth inning, then added another insurance run in the fifth to help shut the door on UCLA. Six Oregon players hit safely in that contest, while Samantha Pappas (1 for 3, three RBI) and Kelsey Chambers (1 for 2, one RBI) each launched home runs to spark the offense.
Chambers’ round-tripper was her second in as many days, and her team-high 13th of the season, while Pappas now has eight home runs this year. Freshman catcher Alexa Peterson paced Oregon throughout the weekend offensively, and finished 5 for 7 with three runs scored.
“It shows what we can do when we play pretty much error-free defense, and the bats came hot at the right time,” White said. “Our pitching will be there, it’s just a matter if we play good defense behind them.”
Defensively, Oregon committed an uncharacteristic five errors on the weekend, which proved extremely costly in Friday’s loss, but in the end, they were pleased with overall results.
“It felt good,” Rumfelt said of Saturday’s win. “I feel like I progressed throughout the year, and what’s better than Senior Day to bring it home?”
The Ducks finished above .500 in Pac-10 play for just the second time ever, and the first time since they finished second at 13-7 in 1989. @@http://www.goducks.com/ViewArticle.dbml?SPSID=4377&SPID=245&DB_LANG=C&DB_OEM_ID=500&ATCLID=205151112@@
With UCLA win in rear view, Oregon Ducks softball set for University Park NCAA Regional
Daily Emerald
May 14, 2011
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