No. 21 Arizona trailed Washington 2-1 in the top of the third inning before a deep three-run home run from Mason White put the Wildcats up for good in a 6-5 win that eliminated the Huskies in day two of pool play in the Pac-12 Tournament Wednesday night at Scottsdale Stadium.
The ball traveled 443 feet, soaring at 109 miles per hour off the bat over the right field wall.
It reminded White of a grand slam former Arizona standout Chase Davis hit in the semifinals of the Pac-12 tournament last season.
“You know it’s funny, I hit it, and I was like, ‘Wow, it looks a lot like the ball Chase hit against Stanford,’ so it was kind of a flashback,” he said.
Arizona looked like a much different team on Wednesday than the one that lost two out of three games at Washington in late April.
“It was just tough,” White said of the Washington series. “We were just dealing with a lot. Fogle (Easton Breyfogle) got hurt, I think, on Saturday, so we were looking for an extra dude to step up for us. Overall, it was just one of those weekends that we were doing our best to grind it out.”
Arizona began the Pac-12 Tournament on day two of pool play as the No. 1 seed after winning the regular season conference championship last Saturday with a 4-3 win over Oregon State at Hi Corbett Field.
It was a big change from last season when the Wildcats entered the tournament as the No. 8 seed, eventually losing to No. 6 seed Oregon in the championship game.
White says entering the conference tournament as the No. 1 seed didn’t change the team’s mentality and approach.
“It’s not any different,” he said. “We’re just trying to win games just like we were last year and just like we were for opening night this year. We’re just playing baseball as a team.”
Arizona plays No. 6 seed California on Thursday at 7 p.m. at Scottsdale Stadium. The win against Washington Wednesday earned Arizona a spot in the semifinals on Friday.
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ALLSPORTSTUCSON.com writer Kevin Murphy was born and raised in Tucson, and has followed Arizona Wildcats athletics since childhood. Murphy is a journalist product manager with the Green Valley News & the Sahuarita Sun. He has a bachelor’s degree from the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at ASU.
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