LAWRENCE, Kan. – In authoring the latest chapter of her storybook redshirt freshman campaign, Isabella Vega produced one of her most dominant appearances as she continues to make her case to become the program’s first Big 12 Conference major post-season award winner.
As she stifled the Kansas Jayhawks throughout the teams’ Friday series-opener, Vega surrendered just three total baserunners in tossing the first no-hitter of her collegiate career, leading the Knights to a 7-0 win at Arrocha Ballpark.
“It feels amazing,” she said. “I’m really proud of myself and it’s a great experience to be able to do that with my team and have that be a first for me.”
The effort, UCF’s second no-hitter of the season after Kaitlyn Felton blanked Quinnipiac Feb. 20, lowered Vega’s season ERA to a miniscule 1.25 through 106.1 innings this spring, including a Big 12 Conference-leading 0.92 ERA in league play, as she pursues the league’s Freshman of the Year recognition.
Isa’s masterpiece also marked the 26th no-hitter in program history, the second by a freshman, joining Mackenzie Audas’ May 1, 2012 showing against Bethune-Cookman, and the second in program history against a power four team at the time of the game.
“I’m just really proud of her. She continues to get better with each game she throws, and it’s especially tough this late in the year against a conference opponent that hits well like Kansas,” said head coach Cindy Ball-Malone. “She used the field and wind to her advantage with the pitches she threw.”
Bolstered by timely offensive exploits throughout her appearance, she begun her outing with a pair of strikeouts in the bottom of the first inning, utilizing the punchouts to escape an early jam created by a hit-by-pitch and UCF defensive error.
Including the final out of the first frame, Vega would then dispatch of the next eight straight Jayhawks, before issuing a one-out walk in the fourth. She calmly pitched around it, though, inducing a pair of subsequent pop outs to punctuate the inning.
Three more perfect innings would follow, highlighted by soft contact from Kansas’ hitters and two more strikeouts to conclude her historic start.
“I knew that I had to continue what I was doing, keeping hitters off balance and trusting whatever coach Bear called,” Vega added. “I had trust in my defense behind me so that we could be in a good position to win the game and keep getting back to the dugout to continue the offensive momentum.”
A trio of two-run innings with a seventh score in the top of the seventh inning supported Vega during her early-evening start, beginning with a two-run single by Aubrey Evans that cashed in on a bases-loaded, two-out opportunity in the second inning.
Ashleigh Griffin and Beth Damon doubled UCF’s advantage in the fifth inning, plating two more on a sacrifice fly and another run-scoring single, and as the game wore on, UCF’s attack continued to roll on.
Evans came through once again in the sixth inning, lining her team-leading ninth home run of the season over the right-center field wall just moments before back-to-back doubles by Sierra Humphreys and Stormy Kotzelnick pushed the Black and Gold’s lead to 6-0.
Damon wasn’t finished either, later clubbing her team’s second homer of the game and her eighth of the spring out to left field in the top of the seventh.
“We put a lot of pressure on the defense. We were putting some good barrels on the ball, just looking for our pitch to drive while also laying off pitches that we shouldn’t be swinging at. We saw a lot of pitches in each at-bat. I’m super proud of the team to get those runs in when we needed them.”
UCF’s Friday win also marked its 30th of the season, clinching the program’s seventh consecutive 30-plus-win season, not counting the COVID-19-shortened 2020 slate, and the sixth straight such campaign under the leadership of Ball-Malone.
UP NEXT
UCF will go for the series win in game two against the Jayhawks, with first pitch from Arrocha Ballpark set for 3 p.m. ET.
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