This Year's National Champion UA Softball Team Was Great, And Next Year's Could Be Even Better. By Tom Danehy THE UA SOFTBALL team's national championship, their fourth in six years, is as satisfying as it was surprising. After losing more than half of the starters off last year's team (which didn't win the championship), this title has a glow all its own, one which sets it apart from all of the other feats accomplished by this, the most dominant athletic program in the history of The University of Arizona. Before the season, they lost to graduation the all-time leading home-run hitter in NCAA history, Laura Espinosa, and an All-American leadoff hitter, Amy Chellevold. They also lost Leah O'Brien to the Olympic team, pitcher Nancy Evans to injury and catcher Leah Braatz to maternity leave. (Wow, just think what would happen if every male college athlete who was involved in a pregnancy had to take a year off from competition. BYU would win the national championship in everything.) So what happens? Freshman Lisa Pitt, who wasn't even planning on pitching, steps in for Evans and goes 16-3 on the season, backing up staff ace Carrie Dolan. Lety Pineda, from Tucson Desert View High, subs for the All-American Braatz and is herself named first-team All-American. (Gee, what does Coach Mike Candrea do next year when he has to choose between two returning first-team All-Americans at the same position?!) The Cats were expected to challenge for the Pac-10 crown this year, but no one expected a national championship. As it turned out, they didn't win the Pac-10 crown. Arizona disposed of much-hated rival UCLA, but ran into a surprisingly stiff challenge from upstart Washington. The Huskies won the Pac-10 crown by one-half game when their last game of the season was wiped out by, of all things, rain in Seattle. That one-half game margin gave the title to Washington, allowed the Huskies to host a regional tournament and sent the Cats all the way to Florida to play in a regional with two Florida schools. Obviously, it all turned out for the best. The Cats marched through postseason play with a perfect 7-0 mark, and they actually made it look pretty easy. Were it not for two uncharacteristic errors in the fourth inning of the championship game, their trip to the title would have been a cakewalk. The hitting was spectacular, the pitching very good, the defense generally steady and the team effort absolutely magnificent. This was a special team. NEXT YEAR'S CAT squad might be much better than this year's team. The Cats lose steady third-baseman Krista Gomez and Player of the Year Jenny Dalton, the NCAA career leader in RBIs and walks. But they get back O'Brien, coming off an Olympic experience; Evans, coming off a nice, long rehab; and Braatz, coming off months of getting three hours' sleep a night (which actually doesn't differentiate her all that much from the average college student). Lose two, gain three. Not bad for a team which has won four titles in six years and finished second in the nation the other two years. In other words, don't bet against their making a seventh consecutive trip to the championship game next season. THE PAC-10 AGAIN dominated the softball scene. Half of the teams in the World Series were Pac-10 teams and all four (Arizona, Washington, Cal and UCLA) won their opening-round games. What I'm wondering is how Michigan and Iowa made the tournament. Iowa probably has the opportunity to play a three-game home schedule before postseason play. And as for Michigan, how can they recruit good softball players? There are just so many $35,000 Ford Explorers to go around. CAT COACH MIKE Candrea continues to live in Casa Grande and commute to work every day. It's not that he's worried about job security; heck, after the third national championship, the UA told him he had a job for life or until his first losing season, whichever came first. He actually likes living in Casa Grande. He has probably given some thought to moving closer to Tucson, maybe splitting the difference, but that would put him in Marana, so that answers that. By the way, I'm being given serious consideration for the Nobel Prize in Economics for having isolated Candrea's commute as a major contributing factor in the recent rise in gasoline prices. That's a small price for us consumers to pay for being able to root for such a great team. The UA should send a limo for him every day. That way there's one less available for junior-high graduations. ONE THING CANDREA has done that no other coach on campus has is to build a program with 100 percent local fan loyalty. Ask Tucson boy basketball players where they'd like to play in college, maybe one-fourth would say the UA. Football players would choose Notre Dame or Penn State or even USC over Arizona more often than not. Even at the height of his success, former Cat baseball coach Jerry Kindall couldn't keep the top local talent at home. But every softball player in Tucson dreams of playing for the UA. From Bobby Sox on up to high-school seniors, that dream is there. And it's getting stronger every year. There was a kid I coached in basketball this year over at Salpointe who also excelled at softball. I asked her if she would go to UCLA. She said if she had a full ride to UCLA, she'd try to walk on at the UA. (That's good, because if UCLA offered a scholarship, it'd probably be in soccer, anyway.) Gotta go. I'm going to take my daughter down to the airport to greet the team. It's something of an annual ritual for us.

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