Bruin Dynasty : UCLA Women’s Softball Coach Puts Success in Perspective

UCLA women’s softball Coach Sharron Backus is beginning to learn the lesson that John Wooden learned when his Bruin basketball teams were in the midst of winning 10 NCAA championships:

Success may breed more success, but it also fosters pressure and anxiety.

Backus, whose Bruins last week won their sixth NCAA championship in her 14 years as coach, said any talk of a dynasty makes her recall what the Wizard of Westwood said when he heard similar talk.

“John Wooden once said that he wished one national championship to his best friends, but four to his enemies.”

Backus is well aware of what it’s like to be the enemy.

Her team defeated Fresno State, 1-0, in the final of the NCAA Division I College World Series and won five straight games in the tournament at Fresno. The victories gave her a career record of 485-113-3, including a 57-12 mark in postseason play.

In addition to six national titles for her UCLA teams--five in the 1980s, the sixth in 1978--they also have two second-place and two third-place national finishes.

Such success has its pleasures, but apparently it also has drawbacks.

Backus said that winning teams may create “the environment to be successful” but that success also “makes it difficult to keep things in perspective.

“You don’t want to put pressure on yourself and the players, (but it happens, nevertheless). And yet the girls played very well. They hung together and were just a real pleasure at the tournament.”

She said that UCLA’s winning tradition has long attracted winning athletes and that the success has made recruiting even easier and also given the softball program “visibility, things you work hard for.

“Then comes the self-imposed pressure to top yourself each year, and this year was very hard emotionally on me and the players.”

Next year’s topper could be a third straight NCAA championship. Backus’ Bruins have won back-to-back titles this year and last and also in 1984-85.

But it won’t be easy. Backus must find replacements for a group of star seniors that includes pitcher Samantha Ford, third baseman Janice Parks, catcher Monica Tourville and shortstop Karen Walker.

The hardest to replace may be Parks.

An All-American for the third straight season, Parks batted more than .400 this season--in a sport where a .270 hitter is considered good. She also established a flock of career and single-season hitting records.

Backus said that she will probably use two players at third base next year: sophomore Kerry Dienelt, who will move from first base, and incoming freshman Lisa Fernandez, the pitching and hitting star from St. Joseph High School in Lakewood. Junior utility player and pinch hitter Shelley Montgomery will take over for Dienelt at first base. Returning on the mound will be the team’s two aces: junior Lisa Longaker (18-1) and Tiffany Boyd (19-2). Boyd capped a sensational freshman season by winning three games in the World Series, including a no-hitter in the opener against South Carolina.

But Ford will be missed not only for her pitching skills but for her competitive fire. She overcame arm problems and had a strong senior season. She pitched a perfect game during the regular season (against Oregon State), shut out Cal Poly Pomona, 9-0, in the World Series and finished with an 11-1 record.

“Sammie had arm problems early in her career, but this year she really came into the season ready and hellbent to do well--and she did,” Backus said. “She is also one of the few athletes in my program who will graduate in four years, which is a real credit to her. She’s a winner.”

Parks, Boyd and Dienelt were named to the All-World Series team, as were sophomore second baseman Missy Phillips and sophomore center fielder Lorraine Maynez, the team’s hottest hitter in the series. Maynez set series records with a .588 batting average (10 for 17) and six runs scored and tied another with four hits in one game (against Cal Poly Pomona).

Other regulars returning include sophomore right fielder Shanna Flynn and left fielder Yvonne Gutierrez, a freshman from Culver City High School. Flynn was named a second-team All-American this season, and Backus said that Gutierrez often provided key base hits.

Since Backus will have plenty of pitching in Longaker and Boyd, Fernandez and a couple of other recruits who starred as pitchers in high school probably will play mostly in the infield and outfield.

The other top pitchers she recruited are Heather Compton of Righetti High School in Santa Maria and DeDe Weiman of Gahr High in Cerritos. Compton’s sister Tracy was one of the best pitchers ever to play for Backus at UCLA, and the coach said that Heather is “the same kind of power pitcher.”

All three are excellent hitters as well, and Backus said that Fernandez “is probably the premiere hitter” of the trio.

Another top freshman will be catcher-utility player Maria Rodriguez of Corona del Mar High in Newport Beach.

So the top players continue to come to UCLA, the beat will be expected to go on, and fans will be clamoring for a third straight national championship.

Backus will just have to hope that the increased pressure from all that noise and from having to don one crown after another doesn’t give her a king-sized headache.