UW Softball Weekly Roundup: Winning Streak Ends in NoCal
Washington entered its California swing riding as much momentum as any team in the country. The Huskies had won 20 straight games, climbed into the top 15 nationally, and looked among the class of the Big Ten through the first half of conference play. But the trip to Palo Alto served as a reminder that even very good teams can hit turbulence away from home.
UW opened the week with a split against Saint Mary’s and Stanford, then dropped two more close games later in the weekend to finish the trip 1-3. By the end of it, the Huskies had fallen to 31-9 overall, though they remained undefeated in conference play at 12-0. Washington first faced Saint Mary’s on Wednesday and suffered an unexpectedly frustrating 5-2 loss.
The Huskies managed only three hits all game, wasting another strong performance from Alexis DeBoer, who homered in the fourth inning to open the scoring. Ava Carroll added an RBI double later in the frame to give UW a 2-0 lead, but everything unraveled in the sixth. Saint Mary’s scored five runs in the inning, aided by a Washington error and a key RBI triple, turning what looked like a comfortable Huskies win into an upset loss.
Washington quickly bounced back later that same day with perhaps its best nonconference win of the season. The Huskies knocked off then-#24 Stanford, showing the kind of resilience that had defined their long winning streak. Stanford had the stronger national profile entering the game and playing at Stanford Softball Stadium gave the Cardinal a quasi-home-field edge, but UW found enough offense and enough pitching to pull out the victory.
That split felt important in the moment because it kept the Saint Mary’s loss from becoming the entire story of the day. Instead of leaving Wednesday frustrated and doubting themselves, the Huskies left with a top-25 win in hand. Unfortunately for UW, the rest of the weekend did not continue that rebound.
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