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WCWS: Rachel Garcia homers UCLA Softball into the championship series

By Mike Regalado

BOULDER, CO - SEPTEMBER 29: The Bruins flag flies as the UCLA Bruins score a touchdown against the Colorado Buffaloes at Folsom Field on September 29, 2012 in Boulder, Colorado. UCLA defeated Colorado 42-14. (Photo by Doug Pensinger/Getty Images)
BOULDER, CO - SEPTEMBER 29: The Bruins flag flies as the UCLA Bruins score a touchdown against the Colorado Buffaloes at Folsom Field on September 29, 2012 in Boulder, Colorado. UCLA defeated Colorado 42-14. (Photo by Doug Pensinger/Getty Images) /
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After ten strenuous innings, the UCLA softball team is heading back to the Women’s College World Series Championship as Rachel Garcia smashes a 3-RBI, walk-off home run to beat Washington.

If you saw the Women’s College World Series semifinal between the no. 3 Washington and no. 2 UCLA softball teams, then you witnessed greatness. It was a duel for the ages as two of the best pitching teams in the country had to go ten innings before allowing a score.

RELATED: Rachel Garcia is the USA Player of the Year, Again

Lucky for the Bruins, their pitching ace, Rachel Garcia, produced that score as she had the biggest hit of the game when she blasted a three-RBI, walk-off home run in the bottom of the 10th to send UCLA to their first WCWS Championship since 2010.

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It was the duel between UW’s Gabbie Plain and Taran Alvelo and UCLA’ s Rachel Garcia that made the difference in this game. By the end of the regulation seven innings, both teams had combined for only 9 hits in the game.

The Husky pitching and defense held on as long as they could as they had a total of 11 strikeouts and only allowed seven hits with no runs, up until the crucial final at-bat by Garcia, that is. Before we get into that, let us talk about her time in the pitching circle.

Despite having back-up, head coach Kelly Inouye-Perez stuck with Garcia through consecutive three games this weekend. She then showed how much she really trusts her two-time USA Player of the Year as she left her in for the entire game against UW.

This decision was a considerable risk. If UCLA had lost this game, they would have gone to an elimination game with Washington shortly after and that would have put in the question Garcia’s status as she had already thrown 179 pitches in this game. Though she had an impressive 16 strikeouts, it would have been hard to emulate in the second game of the day.

Still, it wasn’t her pitching that Washington needed to worry about, it was her bat. In an exciting turn of events, Garcia had a chance to end the game in the bottom of the eighth. With two runners on base, Garcia blasted one to left center, but Husky OF Sami Reynolds made an incredible lunging catch to end the inning.

https://twitter.com/NCAAsoftball/status/1135292029574025216

Two innings later, in what can only be described as a serendipitous, Garcia was once again up to bat with two on. After a foul, ball and a foul, Garcia launched one to left field bringing in Briana Perez and Aaliyah Jordan to get the 3-0 walk-off win.

The Bruins will now head into the best-of-three championship round between the winner of no. 1 Oklahoma and no. 8 Alabama. This is the first time they have been there since 2010 and will be in the hunt for UCLA’s 118th National Championship. Go Bruins!