With a pair of wins last Saturday over UC Santa Barbara, the UC Davis softball team sewed up a spot in the Big West championship tournament May 6-9 at Cal State Fullerton’s Anderson Family Field.
The Aggies, 15-9 in the Big West and 26-22 overall under 11th-year head coach Erin Thorpe, dropped the Gauchos, 8-3 and 2-1, on Saturday, before losing Sunday’s series finale, 3-0.
The top six teams in the 10-team league qualify for the double-elimination Big West tournament, with the winner moving on to the NCAA championships through regional play.
Fullerton is running away with the regular-season crown with a 22-2 mark, with one of those losses coming to the Aggies.
Hawaii is second at 18-6, followed by UC Santa Barbara at 17-7, with the Aggies and Long Beach State tied for fourth at 15-9.
UC San Diego is sixth at 9-15.
The Aggies finish the season with three weekend games at Cal Poly, 4-20, with a doubleheader Friday at 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. and a single game Saturday at 1 p.m.
Should the Aggies tie with either Santa Barbara or Long Beach in the final standings, they would win the tiebreaker based on head-to-head play with those schools.
UCD swept Long Beach State earlier this month.
Gia Felice, a senior from Hollister, leads the Aggies with a .367 batting average, with Sydney Polli at .366 and Alyssa Dethlefson at .308 with five home runs and 29 RBI. Dethlefson also leads the team with 23 steals on 28 attempts.
Naomi Kalanetra, who starred at Davis High School, leads the Aggies with six home runs.
Ashley Sawai has been lights out in the circle with an 11-4 mark and 3.26 earned run average.
Caroline Grimes is 13-14 with a 3.43 ERA and 106 strikeouts in 157 innings of work.
