Sophomore Taylor Tinsley is their No. 1 right now but she's not strong enough to be a "weekend pitcher" (Throwing on Fridays and Sundays) yet. Kaitlyn Terry is only a Freshman and is pitching like one, and transfer Jada Cecil came from UC San Diego and is nowhere near used to the competition UCLA faces week in and week out. It is going to be a long season for their pitching staff.
What has surprised me though, is what has happened to their offense? They had almost everyone returning from last year and secondly, do they not practice defense anymore? That has been simply awful by Bruin standards.
I'm not sure what KIP needs to do, short of everything, but they have certainly gone off the rails. While they did have wins over Maryland and San Diego 6-5 and 7-6, they weren't particularly impressive and now stand at 2-3 on the season and I can't remember that kind of start for the Bruins in....well.....??? a very long time......
If they can't come out of this tailspin, then next weekend in Clearwater is not going to be pretty.
It is truly a case of how the mighty have fallen. I look back to the 2019 WCWS and see a formidable UCLA that beat a really good OU team pretty easily. Now look at them. I would not be happy with their coach if I was a UCLA fan. Washington has continued to excel and now Stanford is coming along.
I think recruiting has suffered majorly and I'm not sure they are really that well coached when you look at how poorly they play defense.