(Photo: Troy Tauscher/WCSN)
As was the case Friday, the Arizona State Sun Devils (14-6) squashed the Princeton Tigers in their first game of a doubleheader before falling in the second, this time to the Wisconsin Badgers.
Arizona State went down 2-0 in the top of the first to Tigers, courtesy of a homer by catcher Keeley Walsh. When the Devils got their turn, they beat Tigers’ starter Alex Viscusi with patience. ASU took four walks and one hit by pitch from Viscusi before she was relieved by Riley Wilkinson. In total, the Devils hung eight runs on Princeton in the bottom of the first.
Sophomore infielder Bella Loomis headlined the scoring outburst with a grand slam, and she would find the yard again in the fourth. After not hitting a home run in her freshman season, Loomis has three this weekend and five on the year.
“Honestly, I’m just staying loose out there, staying relaxed and for me, it’s just hitting a pitch in my zone,” Loomis said.
ASU head coach Trisha Ford has been wanting to see Loomis, one the team’s defensive leaders, grow her game at the plate. She echoed Loomis’ belief that the sophomore is finding the right times to go after hits.
“She’s swinging at pitches that are her pitches,” Ford said. “She’s not getting flustered no matter what the count is. We all know what she’s capable of doing and she’s starting to really blossom as a player.”
ASU scored two runs apiece in the second, third and fourth innings en route to a 14-5 mercy rule win. Freshman pitcher Abby Andersen gave up four hits and one earned run in the start.
The evening went sour for Arizona State in the second game against Wisconsin, resulting in a 5-1 loss. Junior Samantha Mejia struggled to keep Wisconsin off the bases and was pulled after two innings. A pair of leadoff singles set up a three-run bomb by Caroline Hedgecock, putting the Devils in a hole early.
Junior Cielo Meza entered in relief of Mejia and ended up having one of her best outings of the season. Meza gave up no hits while striking out five and walking three.
“I thought she had better rhythm and timing,” Ford said. “She was aggressive, she was on offense when she was on the mound. I thought that was really good that she held her tempo.”
Kindra Hackbarth led off the game for ASU with a single to shortstop, notching her 100th hit in a Sun Devil uniform. Hackbarth has started 81 of 81 games for the Devils since transferring from Fresno State last season. In regards to her mindset from the batter’s box, Hackbarth said “I go up thinking I have nothing to lose,”
With Meza stopping the bleeding, Arizona State may have been able to make a comeback. However, the hot bats of the first game went cold at the hands of Wisconsin’s Haley Hestekin. The sophomore pitched five innings, giving up two hits and one earned run. In a reversal of the previous game, the Devis were not as patient and only saw one walk.
“We were making things that shouldn’t be things,” Ford said. “Hitting is very simple. You gotta be on time and get a good pitch. When other things start to factor into that, then you know it’s going to be a tough day at the ballpark.”
The Badgers defense played well behind Hestekin, fielding line drives and going to the ground to make a couple of key catches. For Ford, the key is responding when those tough outs don’t go their way.
Arizona State has not only beaten teams below them this season, they have throttled them. The Devils have scored 10+ runs seven times so far this year, a mark last year’s Women’s College World Series squad only reached once in the non-conference schedule.
However, when faced with ranked or receiving votes opponents like Florida, Texas and Wisconsin, ASU has not been able to muster enough production on offense or in the circle to topple those opponents. In Hackbarth’s view, it’s because the team is thinking too much about tomorrow and not enough about today.
“We always try to say ‘We’ll get them next time,’ but there is no next time,” Hackbarth said. “We have to stop thinking that way and just keep getting better. We need to learn from our mistakes.”
While there may be a next time during the three-game series of conference play, teams like Washington, UCLA and Arizona do not get any easier to hang with on days two or three. Sunday’s rematch against N0. 9 Texas may serve to show whether ASU is starting to turn a new leaf on the mental front.
