Morales feels back in form following downswing in 2016

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DENNIS ODA / DODA@STARADVERTISER.COM

The UH Wahine softball team gathers for team pictures at the softball stadium on lower UH campus. Included are the 5 UH pitchers (l-r) Jennifer Iseri (#00), Naomi Monahan (#32), Heather Morales (#10), Kanani Aina-Cabrales (#25) and Brittany Hitchcock (#7).

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A senior on the roster, Heather Morales is looking more like her sophomore self at the plate this spring.

After posting the University of Hawaii softball team’s top batting average in 2015, Morales saw her production dip in a junior season addled by injury.

Back to full health, the senior first baseman’s swing has also returned to form as UH’s leading run producer so far this season.

“I feel a little more relaxed than I did last year,” Morales said. “This year I knew I just had to be aggressive and go after the pitches I needed to rather than being more anxious.”

Coming off her second Big West field player of the week award in the past month, Morales will try to maintain her comfort level on the road when the Rainbow Wahine open a conference series at Cal State Northridge today.

UH (23-11, 2-1 Big West) and CSUN (21-13, 1-2) bring the Big West’s top two offenses into the three-game series at Matador Diamond. The Rainbow Wahine and Matadors are scheduled to play a single game today at noon Hawaii time and a doubleheader on Saturday at 10 a.m.

The Rainbow Wahine hit. 398 as a team while opening the Big West season with a series win over UC Davis last weekend to raise their season average to a league-high .305.

Morales went 6-for-11, drove in five runs and launched her sixth home run of the season last week, raising her season average to .354 and her RBI total to a team-high 26. She went to the opposite field with a line-drive double off the fence in right center on March 31 and pulled her home run over the netting beyond Rainbow Wahine Softball Stadium’s left-field fence on Saturday.

“Sometimes it’s picking a spot on the field where you want to hit it,” she said. “Pick a sign in the outfield and go with that pitch.”

Morales hit a team-high .331 as a sophomore in 2015. Hampered by injuries for a chunk of last season, her average dipped to .237 in UH’s 24-30 season. UH coach Bob Coolen noted Morales is handling the on- and off-field pressures with greater ease as a senior, contributing to her rhythm at the plate.

“(Last year) we had a different team makeup and I think she was trying to put out a lot of fires,” Coolen said. “Heather’s handling a lot of the tugs and pulls a lot better and (is) a lot more mature, and that’s helping her because she’s putting it in perspective.”

After completing a 27-game homestand, the Wahine headed to Southern California on Wednesday on their second road trip of the season.

CSUN avoided being swept by Long Beach State with a 10-1 win on Sunday. The Matadors are hitting a collective .298 and lead the conference with 35 home runs, with UH second at 30, already five ahead of last season’s total.

CSUN center fielder Taylor Glover enters the series as the Big West leader in batting average (.404) and RBIs (19). Senior second baseman Tara Kliebenstein, sister of former UH catcher/outfielder Sharla Kliebenstein, is hitting .296 with 16 RBIs.