STARKVILLE, Miss. - Perennially one of the strongest softball conferences in the nation, the Pac-10 finds seven of its teams ranked in the first edition of the USA Today/NFCA Coaches Poll, released Wednesday.
The two-time defending national champion, Arizona, has been named the No. 1 team in the nation after the Wildcats received 27 of a possible 29 first-place votes. Arizona's top-ranking marks the 18th consecutive year in which the Wildcats have held the top spot in the national rankings for at least a part of the year.
The Wildcats are coming off a 2007 campaign in which they posted a 50-14-1 record en route to the 10th Pacific-10 Conference title and eighth NCAA Championship in program history.
Not far behind is Arizona State, which begins the season at No. 3. The Sun Devils feature the reigning Pac-10 Player of the Year, Kaitlin Cochran, as well as Pac-10 Pitcher of the Year, Katie Burkhart.
Washington, the other Pac-10 team, along with the Wildcats and Sun Devils, to advance to the Women's College World Series, enters the year ranked No. 11.
UCLA follows at No. 14 and a trio of Pac-10 teams round out the Top 20 as Oregon State sits in 18th, Stanford in 19th, and Oregon in 20th.
California also received votes in the poll.
The Pac-10 Coaches Poll will be released next week.