UC Riverside senior Kayla White and Hawai`i senior Kaia Parnaby secured Big West Softball Field Player and Pitcher of the Week plaudits as both helped their teams to 6-2 records.
White Scores 10 Runs In Productive Week For Highlanders
Senior Kayla White (San Jose, Calif./Piedmont Hills HS) displayed power, speed and consistency to help UC Riverside post a 6-2 record and earn Big West Softball Field Player of the Week honors.
The 5-5 outfielder hit .545 (12-for-22) with 10 runs scored and seven RBI as the Highlanders recorded two victories each against Southern Utah, Bethune-Cookman and Iona. Among White's 12 hits, she had a double, two triples and a home run. In addition, she also swiped four bases in four attempts.
White hit safely in seven of the eight games, including three multi-hit efforts. She went 6-for-7 with two triples, a home run, five runs scored and three RBI in a doubleheader sweep of Bethune-Cookman. She also drove in three more and stole a pair of bases in a back-to-back wins versus Iona.
In the 8-5 victory over Iona Sunday, White delivered the game-winning RBI on a double.
Others nominated: Korinne Randazzo (Cal State Northridge); Nalani St. Germain (Long Beach State); Megan Guzman (UC Davis); Samantha Stark (UC Santa Barbara); Kaile Nakao (Hawai`i)
Dominant Parnaby Wins Third Pitcher of the Week Award
Hawai`i senior Kaia Parnaby (Bilgola Plateau, NSW, Australia/NBSC Freshwater Senior Campus) set a school single-game record for strikeouts and allowed just three runs in 51.0 innings of work to garner the Big West Softball Pitcher of the Week award for the third time this season.
Parnaby, who posted a 6-1 record with a miniscule 0.41 ERA last week, claimed the Most Valuable Pitcher award at the UH-hosted Chevron Spring Fling Tournament.
She also earned the College Sports Madness National Pitcher of the Week award for her efforts.
Parnaby had double-digit strikeouts in four of her seven tournament appearances on the week, but none more than the 17 batters she fanned in the tournament championship game against Syracuse. The 17 whiffs established a single-game school record as the Rainbow Warriors defeated the Orange, 3-2, in 12 innings. Parnaby allowed just one hit and an unearned run in eight relief innings.
In the tournament opener, she struck out 15 Syracuse batters and followed that up with 12 K's in a four-hit shutout of East Carolina.
Parnaby delivered a one-hit shutout with eight strikeouts in a 1-0, eight inning victory over Utah and notched a two-hit shutout of Syracuse, fanning 11 Orange in their second meeting of the tournament.
Her only setback came in a 1-0 loss to No. 4 California. In that game, Parnaby scattered nine hits and did not walk a batter. Unfortunately, she had her 14-game win streak snapped in the process.
To get into the tourney title game, Parnaby helped UH defeat No. 14 Baylor by a 5-1 score. She surrendered just four hits and one run, did not walk a batter and struck out eight.
The win over Syracuse in the title game gave her 20 for the season and upper her strikeout total to 214. Both totals represent career highs, surpassing the 19 wins and 193 strikeouts she had in 2010.
Parnaby recorded her seventh, eighth and ninth shutouts of the season and walked no one in four appearances.
Others nominated: Shelly Tait (Cal State Northridge); Erin Jones-Wesley (Long Beach State); Justine Vela (UC Davis); Ashley Ercolano (UC Riverside); Andriana Collins (UC Santa Barbara)