ATHENS — Amazing what a little dedication can do.
That’s the testimonial of Georgia softball’s Erin Arevalo. The senior pitcher from Lathrop, Calif., is having a phenomenal senior season, which she says is the result, first and foremost, of her merely deciding that’s the kind of final year she wanted to have.
“It’s my last year, and I just wanted to go out with a bang,” the 5-foot-10 right-hander. “I’ve been working my butt off for the last four years, so why not have something to show for it, I guess?”
But this wasn’t merely mind over matter. Arevalo decided to improve her fitness by following the famous “Insanity” plyometric workout. She spent all last summer and this fall fine-tuning her location and mastering her half-dozen-plus pitches with new pitching coach Tara Archibald. And when it came time to get ready for the season, she stepped on the mound with the intention of demonstrating to coach Lu Harris-Champer that she would be Bulldogs’ go-to player for 2012.
With that criteria met, Georgia has ridden Arevalo’s right arm deep into the postseason. In what at the outset looked like a rebuilding season, the Bulldogs (44-15) instead became a No. 10 national seed and after winning the Athens Regional, take on Tennessee (50-11) in an NCAA Super Regional in Knoxville this weekend with yet another trip to the College World Series on the line.
“She’s pitching the best I’ve ever seen her pitch,” said Harris-Champer, who recruited Arevalo out of East Union High School and the Northern California fast-pitch leagues four years ago. “She’s doing a great job commanding her break and location pitch-by-pitch. I think she came out with a great commitment to lead this team. She’s worked hard, and hard work is paying off.”
That’s an understatement. Arevalo has proved to be almost unhittable this season, particularly important since this has been one of the Bulldogs’ least productive seasons on offense in a while. She enters the best-of-three series with Tennessee with a 26-7 record and 1.37 earned-run average.
Even more impressive is how she’s getting her outs. She has 256 strikeouts in 225 innings, with only 45 walks. In this past weekend’s regional, she had 16 strikeouts, with 11 of those swinging.
To put that in perspective, Arevalo had recorded only 236 strikeouts in her career entering this season. In fact, after starting 24 games for the Bulldogs as a sophomore, she started only five last season.
Morgan Montemayor started 35 games in 2011, and it was assumed she would be the No. 1 starter again this season. But Arevalo had other ideas and, with Harris-Champer, the competition is always ongoing.
“Erin is having a phenomenal senior season, and we’re all very, very happy for her,” Harris-Champer said. “Mo had a great year last year. For me, it’s just about coming out and competing and whoever gets it done at the time you kind of roll with. Mo’s been having great workouts in practice; I’m proud of her, too. But, again, it’s just been an outstanding senior season for Arevalo.”
And that has translated to another great season for the Bulldogs. Georgia, which has played in the NCAA tournament 11 consecutive years under Harris-Champer, claimed its fifth consecutive regional championship this past weekend, each in three games. Now the Bulldogs seek their third Women’s College World Series appearance in the past four years.
Arevalo and the Bulldogs expect an intense battle. They split a doubleheader with Tennessee in early April, with Georgia winning the first game 3-1 in 11 innings and Tennessee taking the second 2-1.
“It’s going to be a tough weekend and it could go either way, but I’m looking forward to it,” Arevalo said. “We just have to focus inning by inning and not get ahead of ourselves. Just not try too hard and play as we always do.”
That formula has been simple: Put the ball in Arevalo’s hand and let her do her stuff.
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