StarBulletin.com

Rainbow Wahine find their groove


By

POSTED: Sunday, February 14, 2010

Hawaii powered its way to a double dose of payback.

The Rainbow Wahine hit eight home runs in two wins yesterday to capture the Oceanic Time Warner Cable Paradise Classic championship, four of the roundtrippers coming in an 11-5 upset of No. 10 Stanford in the tournament final.

Limited to one run on six hits in losses to McNeese State and Stanford earlier in the tournament, the Wahine scored 12 of their 16 runs yesterday via the long ball to improved to 3-2 heading into a two-week road trip with three more ranked teams awaiting.

“;We're still on that journey to find ourselves, and as the weekend went on we found our groove and had confidence at the plate, confidence in each other,”; said senior first baseman Amanda Taualii, who homered in UH's 5-2 win over McNeese State and went 3-for-4 with two doubles against Stanford.

“;Like Coach says: Hitting's contagious, hit like a virus.”;

Less than 24 hours after Stanford ace Ashley Chinn handcuffed the Wahine in a one-hit shutout, Hawaii rallied from a 3-1 deficit on a solo homer by Makani Duhaylonsod-Kaleimamahu and a two-run shot by Traci Yoshikawa in the fourth inning. Alexandra Aguirre's solo homer in the fifth and Katie Grimes' two-out RBI single in the sixth padded the lead.

Two errors with two out allowed Stanford to close to 6-5 going into the seventh, when the Wahine—the designated visiting team—put the game away with a five-run outburst, capped by Kanani Puu-Warren's three-run blast to left.

“;We talked yesterday about coming out (Thursday and Friday) without a purpose, without an identity,”; UH head coach Bob Coolen said. “;They were sort of tentative. We talked a lot about being confident in their abilities.”;

Along with finding their stroke at the plate, the Wahine saw encouraging signs in the circle, with freshman Kaia Parnaby named the most outstanding pitcher of the tournament. Parnaby went 2-0, didn't surrender an earned run and struck out 18 against four walks.

Parnaby had eight strikeouts and benefited from four homers in yesterday's win over McNeese State, which beat UH 2-1 on Thursday. Stephanie Ricketts (1-2) then rode UH's power surge to her first win of season in the finale.

“;We saw that Stephanie can be the workhorse, but we also found out Kaia can pitch at this level, which is what we needed to do,”; Coolen said.

Stanford, which features two members of the U.S. national team at the top of the order, went 3-0 over the first two days of the tournament to earn the top seed entering yesterday's bracket play. After UH's win over McNeese State, the Cardinal held off Texas A&M-Corpus Christi 5-2 to reach the final.

UH third baseman Melissa Gonzalez was named the tournament's most valuable player, after hitting .385 for the weekend.

She was joined by Grimes on the all-tournament team. The senior catcher homered twice and drove in eight runs, two above her total for 2009.