Pac-12 announces 2019 softball All-Conference honors

UCLA’s Rachel Garcia named Pac-12 Player of the Year and Pac-12 Pitcher of the Year

Washington’s Sis Bates tabbed Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year

UCLA’s Megan Faraimo named Pac-12 Freshman of the Year

Stanford’s Jessica Allister selected as Pac-12 Coach of the Year


SAN FRANCISCO –– The 2019 Pac-12 Softball Players of the Year and All-Conference Teams, including All-Pac-12, All-Defensive and All-Freshman Teams, were announced today by the Conference office. In a vote of the Conference’s head coaches, UCLA’s Rachel Garcia was selected Pac-12 Pitcher of the Year and repeated as Pac-12 Player of the Year while Bruins teammate Megan Faraimo was tabbed Pac-12 Freshman of the Year. WASHINGTON’s Sis Bates garnered Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year for the second consecutive year. Stanford head coach Jessica Allister was voted Pac-12 Coach of the Year.

Pac-12 Player of the Year & Pac-12 Pitcher of the Year – Rachel Garcia, Jr., P, UCLA (Palmdale, Calif.)
Garcia earns back-to-back Pac-12 Player of the Year honors and was named the 2019 Pac-12 Pitcher of the Year while leading UCLA to a 45-3 overall record and 19-2 league mark heading into the final weekend of the regular season. Garcia is the first player in Conference history to win both Player and Pitcher of the Year in the same season. The Bruins topped the USA Today/NFCA Coaches Poll for five-straight weeks and have maintained a top-3 ranking throughout the year. Garcia received four Pac-12 Pitcher of the Week honors this season, including winning both Player and Pitcher of the Week on March 19 when she also collected Louisville Slugger/NFCA DI National Player of the Week honors. Garcia becomes the 16th all-time Bruin to receive the Pac-12 Player of the Year recognition. The Palmdale, Calif., native notched her third and fourth yearly awards after being selected Pac-12 Freshman of the Year in 2017 and Pac-12 Pitcher of the Year in 2018, and is a three-time All-Pac-12 First Team selection.

The reigning USA Softball Collegiate Player of the Year has been selected as one of 26 finalists for the 2019 honor. Garcia has recorded either a win (20) or a save (2) in 22 of her 23 pitching appearances and has posted nine double-digit strikeout games, including a season-high of 15. While starting 47 games, she has reached base in 24 of her last 25 games, owns the sixth-best batting average on the team (.348), has hit eight home runs with 40 RBIs. Garcia is majoring in history and leads the Conference in ERA (0.71), strikeout-to-walk ratio (7.92) and hits allowed per seven innings (3.78) which also rank second, fifth and ninth, respectively, in the country. Her impressive list of credentials also touts a 2019 Honda Sport Award and NFCA and ESPNW National Player of the Year awards from last season.

Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year – Sis Bates, Jr., INF, Washington (Ceres, Calif.)
Bates is tabbed the Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year for the second-straight season after leading current No. 2 nationally ranked Washington to a 42-7 overall mark and 17-4 Conference record entering the regular-season finale. Bates is a three-time All-Pac-12 honoree along with being selected to the Pac-12 All-Freshman Team in 2017 and earns UW’s fourth all-time defensive nod. The junior owns the fewest errors of any middle infielder in the Pac-12 and the highest career fielding percentage of any shortstop in Washington history (.980). Bates is the only player in the Pac-12 with at least 30 putouts and 30 assists accompanied by fewer than four errors as she has committed one error in 41 league games over the last two years. The social science major has started all 49 games and leads all league players with a .485 batting average during Conference action. Bates is also the Huskies’ leader offensively, registering a .395 overall batting average to go along with 50 runs scored, 90 assists, and 62 hits. Her 203 career hits are the second-most of any active Pac-12 player, behind only California's Lindsay Rood (251 hits), and she became the sixth Husky in program history with 200+ hits in their first three seasons. The returning NFCA All-American First Team member has been selected as a finalist for the USA Softball Collegiate Player of the Year award.

Pac-12 Freshman of the Year - Megan Faraimo, Fr., P. UCLA (Vista, Calif.)
Faraimo has collected 15 victories this season, the sixth-most in the Conference, to become the third-straight Bruin to win Pac-12 Freshman of the Year (Rachel Garcia, 2017; Aaliyah Jordan, 2018) and the eighth all-time. The freshman has guided UCLA to a league-leading 19-2 record and the brink of its 10th all-time Conference title with only one three-game series remaining. Faraimo boasts the second-best ERA in the Conference (1.31), which ranks 17th nationally and fifth among freshman. The 2019 Schutt Sports/NFCA Freshman of the Year top-25 candidate became the first Bruin to throw two no-hitters in the same season since 2015 including the first UCLA freshman to accomplish the feat since 2005. Faraimo is a member of the All-Conference First Team and All-Freshman Team after collecting five Pac-12 Freshman of the Week honors this year.

Pac-12 Coach of the Year – Jessica Allister, Stanford
In her second season at the helm, Allister has guided Stanford to a 32-15 overall record for the program’s most wins in a season since 2013 (39-21) and to an 8-10 Pac-12 mark. The Cardinal enters the last weekend of the regular season in fourth place in the league standings after being picked to finish eighth in the Pac-12 Coaches Preseason Poll. The Cardinal opened Pac-12 play with a 7-2 record for its best start since the 2005 team started 8-2 and went on to claim a share of the Conference title. Stanford has surpassed its overall (24) and Pac-12 (3) win totals from 2018 while its eight Conference wins are more than the previous four years combined (7). Allister also led Stanford to a 12-game win streak, the program’s longest since the 2014 season opened 13-0. Allister was a four-year starting catcher on The Farm and made NCAA Women's College World Series appearances in 2001 and 2004. A Second Team All-American in 2004 and three-time All-Conference selection, Allister holds the Stanford record for career games (266).

2019 PAC-12 ALL-CONFERENCE TEAMS
FIRST TEAM

SECOND TEAM

THIRD TEAM

**two-time All-Pac-12, ***three-time All-Pac-12, ****four-time All-Pac-12
ALL-DEFENSIVE TEAM

^^two-time All-Defensive Team
ALL-FRESHMAN TEAM