Bianca Lopez has made great strides in the last year.

Lopez, a sophomore outfielder from Riverside, Calif., has been a pleasant surprise for the ISU softball team this season. After struggling as a freshman, Lopez has played solid defense all year and has given the Cyclones production out of the number two spot when she is in the lineup.

Although Lopez did not begin the season as a starter, she was able to work her way into right field March 12 and has started 16 of the 20 games since, helping the Cyclones to an 11-5 record in those starts.

“When she got her opportunity to play, she did a really good job,” said coach Stacy Gemeinhardt-Cesler. “Once she was in there playing, it was really hard to take her out of the lineup because she was doing so well.”

Lopez’s freshman season was not what she was used to. Limited playing time, Division I competition and hitting struggles were new to the two-time first-team All-Sunkist League outfielder.

“In the beginning of the season last year I wasn’t doing too well, so I didn’t even start,” Lopez said. “It was a big change for me not playing.”

With sporadic playing time, Lopez stumbled, going 3-for-27 to begin her career for a .111 batting average.

“I was thinking too much,” Lopez said. “I thought, ‘Oh my God, I’m in college, I have to hit the ball every time.’ When I was thinking too much, then all my mechanics were lost.”

In addition to her struggles, Lopez fell into what Gemeinhardt-Cesler described as a common freshman trap.

“Last year it was more of just soaking it all in and being amazed by everything,” Lopez said. “I was really excited all last year whether I was doing well or not. It was kind of a shock that I was actually doing it.”

Lopez ended last season with a decent year for an ISU freshman. She coupled solid defense, spearheaded by her strong throwing arm, with a .210 batting average. But Lopez was not satisfied with that and went to work fixing it when she went home for the summer.

Lopez is 19 years old, and has played softball for 15 of those years.

For the first 14 of those years, Lopez was coached by her father, Abel Lopez.

“He has always been my head coach or one of the head coaches since tee-ball,” Lopez said.

The two worked on Lopez’s softball skills almost non-stop all the way through high school.

“If it was raining outside, we would go to my high school and we would practice in the hallways,” Lopez said. “He would just set up a little thing for me to pitch off of or hit into. We were pretty much softball Nazis. It has always been my life since about [age] 10.”

Therefore, when Lopez returned home from her first season of college ball with a .210 average and what Abel described as “the ugliest swing,” they immediately went to work.

“We went back to the routine I always did before college,” Lopez said. “We hit almost every day. We practice almost every day for an hour max.”

With the help of her father, the only batting coach Lopez had until college, she was able to regain the swing they had worked on together for so long.

“I was really tense,” Lopez said. “The swing I came into college with, I lost, and that’s what I got recruited for. So I just had this swing that wasn’t me and I went home, fixed it, and I’ve been holding on to it, which is good because it’s helping me out.”

Armed with a retooled swing and renewed energy, Lopez rejoined the Cyclones and had a good fall season. Unfortunately for her, so did three other outfielders. With outfielders Heidi Kidwell, Kelsey Kidwell and Carleigh Berry in the starting role, Lopez was the odd woman out.

“We just had four really good outfielders, and they were all hitting above .300,” Gemeinhardt-Cesler said.

This time around, however, Lopez was more mentally prepared for the college season. Her teammates have taken notice.

“Mentally her game is so strong. Whenever we meet with Marty, the sports psychologist, she is always the one to say the first words,” said sophomore pitcher Lauren Kennewell. “If she has a bad at-bat, she will come back and maybe get a hit, or if she has a bad day she doesn’t let it get her down because she will come back the next day 2at practice and just be jacking them all over the place.”

That mentality eventually earned her a starting spot. She wasted no time in making the best of it, going 2-for-4 with an RBI against UC-Santa Barbara. Since then, Lopez has pulled her batting average up 69 points from where it was last year, bringing it to .279.

“Everybody always wants to play, so when you are given opportunities, you have to take advantage of them and that’s what she did,” Gemeinhardt-Cesler said.

In 23 fewer at-bats, Lopez already has five more RBIs and four more extra-base hits than she had as a freshman.

She also has not committed a single error yet this year after making just two errors as a freshman.

“Her confidence level has really increased from last year to this year,” said senior infielder Courtney Wray. “You can just tell she has this presence about her this season.”