(Photo Courtesy of UCLA Athletics)
Junior Ally Carda picked up a trifecta of awards on Tuesday, earning NFCA and USA Softball National Player of the Week honors, as well as Pac-12 Conference Pitcher of the Week accolades, while sophomore Mysha Sataraka was named Pac-12 Player of the Week.
Carda, who earned the first Player or Pitcher of the Week honors of her career, joins Anjelica Selden (March 8-9, 2005 and Feb. 26, 2008), Andrea Duran (April 11 and May 2, 2006), Amanda Kamekona (May 6, 2008), Megan Langenfeld (April 14, 2009) and B.B. Bates (Feb. 19, 2013) as the only Bruins to earn Pac-10/12, NFCA and USA Softball Player of the Week in the same week (2003 was the first year the USA Softball POW was awarded). Carda’s award is the 23rd NFCA National POW and the 15th USA Softball National POW for UCLA.
Sataraka, who received the first Pac-12 Player of the Week award of her career, is the second Bruin to earn the honor in the first three weeks of the year after senior Alyssa Tiumalu picked up the nod on Feb. 11. The Bruins have now earned 69 Pac-12 Player of the Week awards and 55 Pac-10 Pitcher of the Week honors.
Carda pitched the Bruins to four wins in the circle, including three against ranked opponents, and also hit .429 at the plate with four runs batted in and five runs scored, as UCLA went 5-0 at the Mary Nutter Collegiate Classic to improve to 16-0 on the season.
Carda was 4-0 with a 0.67 earned run average and 27 strikeouts in 21 innings. She struck out 10, her third double-figure strikeout game of the year, against #13 Oklahoma on Friday, allowing two unearned runs in a complete-game effort.
The junior won twice on Saturday, tossing three innings of shutout relief versus #16 Missouri, fanning five and allowing only one hit and one walk. Carda won again later that night, striking out five in five innings and giving up four unearned runs against Maryland.
Carda finished the weekend with seven strikeouts in six innings against #11 Nebraska on Sunday, limiting the Huskers to four hits and two runs.
At the plate, Carda had hits in each of the last four games of the weekend, posting two hits and an RBI against Missouri on Saturday and two hits, two runs, an RBI and a stolen base later in the evening versus Maryland.
On Sunday, she posted a single and was hit twice, also scoring a run against Nebraska. In the weekend finale versus New Mexico, Carda had a single, a walk, a hit by pitch and a sacrifice fly, driving in two, scoring twice and stealing three bases.
Carda leads the Bruins with a 9-0 record and 68 strikeouts in 53 innings to go with a 0.40 earned run average. At the plate, she is second with a .413 batting average and 18 runs scored and tied for first with seven stolen bases, adding a home run and 12 runs batted in.
Sataraka hit .500 with nine runs batted in at the Mary Nutter Collegiate Classic, including a two-run, walk-off double against Missouri. Sataraka had seven hits in 14 at-bats, scoring five runs and drawing four walks. She posted an .857 slugging percentage and a .611 on base percentage.
After drawing a walk on Friday versus Oklahoma, Sataraka had a career night on Saturday. Versus Missouri, the sophomore came up to the plate with her team down 3-2 and two on with two outs. After fouling off the first pitch, Sataraka slammed a ball to the right-center field gap for a double, plating both runners to give the Bruins the walk-off victory.
Later on Saturday, Sataraka went 3-for-3 with a career-high five RBI against Maryland, scoring twice and falling a triple shy of the cycle. She had an RBI single in the first, walked and scored in the third, doubled in a run in the fourth and belted a three-run homer in the sixth.
Sataraka had hits in both games on Sunday, going 2-for-3 with two RBI and a run scored against Nebraska and a single, a walk and two runs versus New Mexico.
Sataraka leads the Bruins with 22 runs batted in and is tied for first with three home runs, hitting .333.
The Bruins, who have jumped up to fifth in the latest NFCA and USA Softball rankings, travel to the Long Beach Louisville Slugger Invitational this weekend at Mayfair Park in Lakewood for five more games. UCLA faces #4 Michigan (4:30 p.m.) and Long Beach State (7 p.m.) on Friday, Louisville (2 p.m.) and Northwestern (7 p.m.) on Saturday and Illinois (11:15 a.m.) on Sunday. Free audio and live stats will be available for all five games at UCLABruins.com.
