The No. 9 Arizona softball team will face California State University, Northridge this weekend in a three-game series at Hillenbrand Stadium. The series will be the Wildcats’ last before Pacific 10 Conference play starts next week.

The Matadors are 12-15 this season and will face the Wildcats for the first time since 2006 when they suffered a three-game sweep by Arizona.

Arizona went 3-2 last weekend at the Judi Garman Classic in Fullerton, Calif., with wins over No. 20 Louisiana-Lafayette, DePaul and San Jose State and losses against No. 7 Oklahoma and No. 3 Michigan.

The Wildcats are now 0-4 against top-10 teams this season.

“”We’re not hitting on all cylinders right now,”” said head coach Mike Candrea. “”We need to get the car tuned up and ready to go, more than anything.””

Senior outfielder Brittany Lastrapes said the team realizes the schedule is about to get a lot tougher.

“”Now that we’re half way through the season, I think it’s a little more ‘alright we gotta pick it up now,'”” she said. “”We don’t really have any more room for losses like that. So I think the urgency has picked up a little bit.””

Lastrapes was also named last week’s Pac-10 Player of the Week after she hit .577 with 11 RBIs and at least two hits in six of the Wildcats’ seven games. She is now hitting .510 on the season.

With the Wildcats now four games past the season’s mid-point, senior catcher Stacie Chambers finds herself well within reach of both the Arizona all-time home-run record and the NCAA all-time home run record. With just one homer last week, Chambers now sits at 12 on the season and 79 for her career. She is six shy of Laura Espinoza’s Arizona record and 11 away from former UCLA Bruin Stacey Nuveman’s national mark.

The weekend’s games are at 7 p.m. on Friday and Saturday and noon on Sunday.