UCLA’s Maya Brady, Megan Faraimo and Ally Carda will represent the Red, White and Blue at the World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC) World Cup in Dublin, Ireland from July 11-15, the U.S. Women’s National Team announced on Friday.
Last summer, Brady went 4-for-8 at the 2022 Japan All-Star Series in the first USA Softball action of her collegiate career. Faraimo participated in four USA Softball events in 2022, including the Japan All-Star Series, The World Games in Birmingham, Ala., the Canada Cup and the Pan American Championships in Guatemala City.
Carda, who competed for the Bruins from 2012-15, led Team USA to The World Games gold medal last summer with a heroic relief performance in the circle. The USA Softball veteran pitcher ended the championship game against Japan striking out seven of the nine batters she faced and induced weakly-hit pop out to herself to end the game.
Carda was a two-time NFCA First Team All-American at UCLA her junior and senior seasons in 2014 and 2015.
Competing in Group A, the U.S. will be joined by world-ranked No. 3 Chinese Taipei, No. 9 Australia, No. 16 Great Britain, No. 17 Ireland (host country) and No. 43 Botswana. An additional 12 countries will compete in Group B and Group C.
Brady is playing the best ball of her career this season, leading the team with a .443 batting average, 12 home runs and an .870 slugging percentage. The Thousand Oaks product is in the mix for the Pac-12 Triple Crown, ranking second in both average and homers and third in RBI. Brady has three multi-homer games in 2023 and is up to five in her career.
Faraimo, who has hauled in four Pac-12 Pitcher of the Week awards this season, is currently riding a 26.0 scoreless innings streak dating back to her relief appearance in game two at Oregon on March 26. Over her last five appearances, Faraimo sports a 5-0 record with 34 strikeouts and has allowed just 13 hits (all singles) over 24.2 scoreless innings.
The Oceanside, Calif. native is on the precipice of the second 20-win campaign of her career, achieving the feat for the first time last season. Faraimo picked up her 20th win of 2022 in game 51 on May 14 in the Bruins’ final Pac-12 series of the regular season. She can record her 20th win of 2023 a full month earlier than last season in game one versus Arizona this week.
Faraimo’s 19 wins rank first in the Pac-12 and are tied for the most among all Power 5 conference pitchers. Her 163 strikeouts paces the conference, and with a minimum of 60 innings pitched, Faraimo also leads the Pac-12 with a 1.10 earned run average.
Source : Ucla