May 3, 2000
This Weekend: The 10th-ranked Stanford softball team (41-14, 5-10 Pac-10) will make its final Pac-10 road trip of the season as they travel to the Oregon schools for three games. The Cardinal will open with a single game at Oregon (33-22, 5-10 Pac-10) on Friday, before taking on Oregon State (36-14-1, 6-8 Pac-10) on Saturday and Sunday. The Cardinal went 1-2 at the Stanford Softball Complex in mid-April, defeating Oregon State 3-2 before dropping games 3-1 and 3-2 against Oregon. The Beavers are currently a game ahead of the Cardinal with a 6-8 record, while the Ducks are tied with Stanford at 5-10 in conference play.
Mendoza Memo: Sophomore All-America OF Jessica Mendoza (Camarillo, CA) is proving that there is not a record safe as long as she is on the field for the Cardinal. In her second season on The Farm, Mendoza already appears on seven of 13 Cardinal career statistical lists. Among those records, Mendoza sits atop the career home run list (20), batting average (.447) and stolen bases (20) lists. On the single season lists, Mendoza has already surpassed the record for hits (85), doubles (18), home runs (11), runs scored (53) and stolen bases (14). If her .483 average holds up through the end of the season, she will smash the current record of .415 which she sent last season. Mendoza had a season-high 19-game hit streak that started against Long Beach State (2/19) and continued through a doubleheader against Pacific (3/22). What makes Mendoza's accomplishments even more impressive is the fact that she reahcing the milestones against the best pitching conference in the nation. Pac-10 pitchers have posted a 1.36 ERA and strikeout 6.52 batters per game this season.
More Mendoza: Jessica Mendoza earned Pac-10 Player of the Week honors for the second consecutive week after hitting .500 (8-for-16) in five games for the Cardinal between April 24-30. Mendoza scored three runs, hit a double and had an RBI in a doubleheader sweep of Sacramento State. In Pac-10 play, Mendoza had two hits, including a double, against UCLA, and went 3-for-5 with a stolen base at Washington. Mendoza is the only player this season to grab three Pac-10 Player of the Week awards.
Even More On Mendoza: Could she make it three Pac-10 Player of the Week awards in a row? Mendoza is off to a great start this week, hitting .857 (6-for-7) in a doubleheader against San Jose State last Tuesday. Mendoza went 3-for-4 with a double and two runs scored in the first game. Mendoza got red hot in the second game with two home runs, the first a second inning grand slam, a double, six RBI and two runs scored. Her two home runs increased her season total to 11, setting a new Stanford single season record and giving her 20 for her career. Against the Beavers and Ducks earlier this season, Mendoza hit .400 (4-for-10) with a home run and two RBI.
National Leaders: Amongst the NCAA national leaders released May 2, Jessica Mendoza ranks second in batting average (.467) and sophomore OF Sarah Beeson (Tucson, AZ) is 21st in RBI with 50. Freshman P Dana Sorensen's (San Diego, CA) ERA of 1.01 is ranked 32nd amongst the nation's pitchers. As a team the Cardinal has the 21st best winning percentage at .736 (39-14).
Cardinal Chronicle: Jessica Mendoza leads the team in multiple hit games with 25, followed by Sarah Beeson with 17 and sophomore SS Robin Walker (La Palma, CA) with 16... Mendoza and Walker each have one game in which they have four hits... Beeson has 13 games this season in which she has totaled two or more RBI, including four 3 RBI games, two 4 RBI games and one 7 RBI game... Junior 3B Jenni Shideler (San Jose, CA) went 3-for-4 (.750), with two RBI against Sacramento State... Mendoza enters the trip to Oregon with a nine game hitting streak.
Sorensen's Story: Dana Sorensen had another stellar week in the circle for the Cardinal, posting a 1-1 record and a 0.00 ERA in her two starts. Sorensen pitched 10 innings for the win against third-ranked UCLA, allowing four hits, one walk while striking out two. Against top-ranked Washington, Sorensen allowed two hits in six innings, striking out five batters and walking two of 23 batters faced. Sorensen has pitched 32 consecutive innings without allowing an earned run and has dropped her ERA to 1.01, which is on the verge of setting a new Stanford single season record.
40 Wins Again: With its doubleheader sweep of San Jose State last Tuesday, Stanford (41-14) has now won 40 or more games over the past three seasons. This season's 41 victories ties the Stanford record for wins, which was set in 1998. The Cardinal had a 20-25 record last season. Stanford has 30 or more wins since 1997.
Head Coach John Rittman: Year four of the John Rittman era began on Jan. 29. Rittman has led the Cardinal to a 153-84-1 (.643) record through three-plus seasons. He posted his 100th career victory on April 1, 1999, 16-0 over Utah State. Rittman's 150th win came in the second game of a doubleheader against Sacramento State, an 11-5 Cardinal victory. Rittman took over a Stanford program that had never had more than 24 wins in a season and directed the team to 30 wins, and its first-ever winning record, in his rookie campaign. Rittman's squad has won at least 40 games in each of the past three years, advancing to the NCAA tournament twice. The Cardinal had never been ranked before, but Rittman has seen his team climb as high as seventh in the NFCA coaches poll, one year ago, and attain a current national ranking of No. 10.
Most Games Played: Senior All-America C Kellie Wiginton became Stanford's all-time leader in games played April 25 against Sacramento State. Wiginton has played in 236 games to surpass the record of 231 games played, set by Michelle Schneider from 1996-99. This is the third career record that Wiginton has captured this season, after grabbing the top spot in career putouts (1,072) and at-bats (731) earlier in the year.
Can It Get Any Closer: Stanford continued the trend of close Pac-10 games with a 2-1 victory over third-ranked UCLA and a 1-0 loss to top-ranked Washington last week. In 15 conference games played by Stanford, 11 have been decided by 2 or fewer runs. The Cardinal is 3-3 at home and 2-3 on the road in those close ball games.
Non-Conference Record: The Cardinal has posted a 36-4 record against non-conference opponents this season, after sweeping its doubleheader against San Jose State last Tuesday 5-1 and 12-1. The Cardinal won a season-high 15 non-conference games between March 4 and April 4 and is out-scoring out of conference opponents by a 215-to-68 margin. Stanford's hitters have blistered opponents with a .318 average and 22 home runs, while the pitching staff has a combined 1.05 ERA.
Ranking Review: Stanford moved back into the Top 10 at No. 10 in the May 3 edition of the USA Today/NFCA Coaches Top 25. Stanford had entered the week with a 39-14 record and 12 wins over ranked opponents. Stanford had been No. 11 in the April 26 poll. The Cardinal began the 2000 season ranked 21st and has appeared in the Top 25 of every regular-season poll since early in the 1998 season, reaching a high of No. 7 during 1999. Pac-10 teams hold four of the top five spots in the poll, and seven of the top 12. All eight Pac-10 teams are ranked in the top 16 in the latest poll. Stanford's highest ranking of the 2000 season came on March 26 at No. 8.
UCLA Recap: Stanford grabbed its fifth conference victory of the season with a 2-1 victory at third-ranked UCLA last Friday. The Cardinal and Bruins dueled for nine scoreless innings before Stanford scored two runs in the top of the 10th inning. Kellie Wiginton began the 10th inning on second base, as a result of the international tie-breaker rule, advancing to third on a Jenni Shideler walk and a catchers interference call during freshman OF Cassi Brangham's (Clovis, CA) at-bat. Senior 2B Lauren Gellman drew a one-out walk to score Wiginton and Robin Walker followed with a single to increase the lead to 2-0. UCLA added a run in the bottom half of the inning, but Dana Sorensen closed out the game for her 12th complete game of the season and her 20th victory.
Washington Recap: Freshman P Maureen LeCocq (Woodland Hills, CA) pitched five innings of one-hit softball, before eight Washington runs in the sixth inning sealed the game. LeCocq was credited with one earned run and struckout three, before freshman P Jamie Forman-Lau (San Jose, CA) relieved her with no outs in the sixth. Forman-Lau and a Cardinal error allowed the remaining seven runs to score. Stanford tallied two hits and drew four walks on Husky starter Jennifer Spediacci. Two errors in the second game of the weekend series cost the Cardinal its second upset of the week. After catching a pop up at shortstop, Robin Walker's pick off attempt at second went wide of the bag and the subsequent throw to third was misplayed allowing pinch runner Jessica Bork to score. The Cardinal had runners in scoring position in the first, second and sixth innings but were unable to get a key to score a run. Dana Sorensen (20-7) pitched seven innings of two-hit softball, striking out five Husky batters.