Success never oversleeps

Kate Robinson could have hit the snooze bar on those summer mornings.

But discipline has it rewards.

So six times a week, on mornings prime for sleeping in, Robinson would roll out of bed and fight rush-hour traffic from Moanalua to Manoa, where she and her teammates on the Hawaii softball team would push themselves through 2 punishing hours of weight lifting or running.

Notable numbers Hawaii players' statistical ranks in the WAC and the NCAA. Batting Avg. Avg WAC NCAA Tyleen Tausaga .408 1 50 Clare Warwick .389 2 94 HR Per Game Avg WAC NCAA Kate Robinson 0.33 1 14 Tanisha Milca 0.28 2 33 Tyleen Tausaga 0.28 3 34 RBI Per Game Avg WAC NCAA Kate Robinson 1.19 1 8 Tyleen Tausaga 0.93 2 46 ERA Avg WAC NCAA Kate Robinson 1.56 2 51 Justine Smethurst 1.69 3 74

"It's hard motivating yourself to wake up early and drive in," Robinson said of the 7 a.m. workouts. "But it pays off, it's worth it."

The offseason efforts of the Rainbow Wahine were a prelude to a spectacular spring in which they steadily climbed the national rankings and captured the Western Athletic Conference's regular-season title.

As a team, the 13th-ranked Wahine (45-9, 16-2 WAC) muscled up for a WAC-record 79 home runs, led by Robinson's school-record 18, on their way to the top seed in this week's conference tournament in Fresno, Calif.

Individually, Robinson is enjoying a breakout junior year in which she's emerged as a candidate for both WAC player and pitcher of the year.

Along with hitting .365 and driving in a league-high 64 runs, the Kamehameha graduate is the only undefeated pitcher in the WAC at 15-0 and ranks second in the league with a 1.56 earned-run average. She also plays first base when she's not pitching, sporting a sparkling .996 fielding percentage.

Not that she's into checking stats ... much.

"I guess if you just play the game and be consistent the numbers come," she said. "I'll look once every couple weeks, but I try not to dwell on them."

Robinson's production would have been hard to foresee based on relatively nondescript freshman and sophomore seasons. She entered the spring as a career .220 hitter with four home runs, and had appeared in just 15 games as a pitcher with a 5-3 record, though she threw a perfect game in one of her two starts last season.

Though the team's regimen in the weight room contributed to the surge at the plate, Robinson -- who packs her power into a 5-foot-7 frame -- has a hard time pinning down an explanation for her upswing on offense.

"I really don't know what the difference is," she said. "I have the same swing, I'm the same person as last year, it's just this year everything's clicking. My pitch selection is better, I'm a little more patient in the box and the more times you do it the better you get."

Robinson's development as a pitcher has been evident beyond her stats, which, by the way, include 91 strikeouts against 16 walks and an opponent batting average of .213.

"She just has a presence on the mound," UH coach Bob Coolen said. "Presence on the mound is being in control -- being in control of your emotions, being in control of the game, being in control of everything that goes on that you can control. ... She has captured that this year 100 percent."

"I think this year she's more confident in using all of her pitches," said Kristi Yoshizawa, UH's starting catcher last year and a student manager this season. "Last year she didn't really use her changeup too much, but we've worked on it from the end of last year to now and she's confident in throwing every pitch."

Robinson's confidence was evidenced in several clutch situations this season. Among her highlights was a seventh-inning, go-ahead grand slam in a 6-5 win at New Mexico State on April 7. Another was escaping a bases-loaded jam in the final inning of a 2-1 victory over rival Fresno State in UH's final home game.

The latter proved pivotal in the Wahine breaking the Bulldogs' three-year hold on the WAC regular-season crown.

"You could just feel the tension in the air, because I knew if we lost that game it would have brought us down a lot," Robinson said. "I can't even describe how I was feeling. I was, 'Oh my gosh, if I walk this batter, it's over. If that hit got through, it's over.' That was really stressful."

The soft-spoken Robinson, whose sister, Sarah, was a second-team all-state pick at Moanalua this season, has found herself talking a lot more lately as the team's success has translated into increased attention and more interview requests.

But she says the spotlight hasn't blurred a collective focus forged on those summer mornings.

"Everybody's very level headed," Robinson said. "We've never really been in this position before and for us to think, 'We're so good,' I don't think that's our style. Our style is just to come out and play, everything's very relaxed. This team is very calm and we're not thinking about (rankings). We'll think about that at the end of the season."