The 15th-ranked Arizona softball team used some timely pitching to escape with a 7-6 victory over UCLA and avoid a sweep Sunday in a wild game with plenty of lead changes and momentum shifts.
The Wildcats (33-16, 10-11 Pac-12) used a trio of pitchers in the win, with Jessica Spigner starting, Shelby Babcock picking up the win and Kenzie Fowler shutting the door for the save.
Arizona took a 7-5 lead into the bottom of the seventh inning before UCLA (35-16, 11-10 Pac-12) made things interesting. Fowler allowed a leadoff walk before getting the next two batters out, but the Bruins then got back-to-back two-strike singles, the latter of which -- off the bat of Samantha Camuso -- drove in a run to make it 7-6. With the tying run was at second base and the winning run 45 feet behind, Fowler struck out Dani Yudin to end the game.
Fowler’s pressure pitches in the seventh came after she worked out of a bases-loaded, none-out jam in the fifth. With UA ahead by two, Fowler issued free passes to the first two batters she faced and then gave up a bunt single to load the bases. With no one out and the 4-5-6 hitters up, Fowler struck out cleanup hitter B.B. Bates and induced a 1-2-3 double play to end the inning.
Eight of the game’s 13 runs scored on homers, with the Wildcats getting blasts from Brigette Del Ponte and Kristen Arriola.
Camuso drove in all six of UCLA’s runs in the game and had two home runs.
Arizona had 10 hits for its fifth double-digit hit game in the last eight contests. Del Ponte, Shelby Pendley, Chelsea Goodacre and Arriola all had two hits for the Wildcats. Pendley and Del Ponte each had two RBIs, while Goodacre, Arriola and Lini Koria had one apiece.
Spigner got the start in the circle and allowed a three-run homer to Camuso in the first inning before getting the hook in favor of Babcock (17-9). The sophomore pitched three innings of effective ball, allowing just one hit, a two-run homer that followed her only walk of the game. Fowler earned her second save of the season, pitching the final three innings and allowing one run on four hits to go along with three strikeouts and two walks.
The Wildcats responded after the Bruins took the early 3-0 lead with a run in the second. UCLA second baseman Talee Snow, with the sun in her eyes, was unable to catch a routine popup behind first base, allowing Pendley to score from second.
In the third inning, Hallie Wilson led off with a single and before Del Ponte hit her 12th home run of the season to tie the score at 3-3.
UCLA regained the lead when Camuso belted her second homer of the game. Babcock got the first two Bruins out in the third before walking Bates and allowing Camuso's homer, giving UCLA a 5-3 lead.
In a wild top of the fourth, Spigner reached on an error to begin the frame and was picked off trying to move to second on a wild pitch. Goodacre then singled off the wall in right but was picked off 9-4-3. After the two pickoffs, Arriola homered to cut the deficit to 5-4.
In the sixth inning, two walks and a single loaded the bases with no one out for Arizona’s 4-5-6 hitters. Pendley hit a go-ahead, two-run single up the middle to give the Wildcats the lead, and Koria followed with a sac fly to make it 7-5.
UCLA stranded five runners the rest of the way.
Arizona returns home to take on Oregon State in what will be the final regular-season series of the year for the Wildcats as well as senior weekend for Arriola, Koria, Spigner, Nicole Bryan and Karissa Buchanan.
