SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — With a sublime start and an effective relief appearance, pitcher Brianna Lopez helped get the Hawaii softball team off to an effective start to the Big West Conference season.

UH earned a doubleheader sweep at UC Santa Barbara on Saturday, 13-2 in five innings and 4-3, to move to 2-0 in BWC play for the second straight year.

Lopez took a no-hitter into the fifth inning in the day’s opener, then settled for a two-hitter in the abbreviated game after receiving a bevy of run support in the first two frames to improve her record to 4-3.

“It felt good. Coming from a win against Cal (6-1 in the nonconference finale on March 12) going into this game against Santa Barbara, I felt very calm and collected,” said Lopez, a freshman left-hander from Riverside, in a postgame phone interview with Spectrum News. “My confidence was up that first game … (from) going up against a Pac-12 team, I mean, it’s a Pac-12 team. Getting that win was a confidence-booster for not only myself but my team as well.”

Third baseman Ka‘ena Keliinoi, hitting in the No. 9 spot, smacked a bases-clearing double in the first inning and a grand slam in the second to finish with seven RBIs, one off the school record of eight set by Jessica Iwata in 2010 and matched by Sharla Kliebenstein in 2013.

Izabella Martinez, Mya’Liah Bethea and Maya Nakamura each added two RBIs.

In Game 2, Lopez came on to pitch three innings of one-hit relief in support of starter Chloe Borges to earn her first save of the season.

After senior Mikaela Gandia-Mak tied it up at 1-1 on an infield single in the fourth, redshirt freshman Haley Johnson hit a three run pinch-hit homer, her first of the season, for a 4-1 UH lead. The Gauchos got a run back in the bottom of the frame then got a no-out RBI double by Ashley Donaldson in the fifth to make it a one-run game.

Lopez immediately tossed a wild pitch to allow Donaldson to advance to third. But she settled down and got two strikeouts and a groundout to get out of trouble.

The freshman got through the sixth unscathed and stranded a runner on second in the seventh with a strikeout and foul out to end it.

“I can’t even lie, I was nervous,” said Lopez, who was making her first double-day appearance since her travel ball days. “I had to go and back up my pitcher Chloe, but I felt good going in knowing I did have them off their toes the first game.”

Borges improved to 4-4 after giving up nine hits and three earned runs in four-plus innings.

UH (8-9, 2-0) and UCSB (8-19, 0-2) conclude the three-game series at 10 a.m. (Hawaii time) on Sunday.

UH coach Bob Coolen told Spectrum News this week that he liked his team’s chances in the Big West given that no team had distinguished itself in nonconference play, save perhaps Cal State Fullerton and Long Beach State.

“I think we’ll be able to compete,” Coolen said. “Every team brings their ace pitcher with them and then hopes on getting a lot of hits (in support) for their second and third pitcher. It’ll be amazing to see how the conference unfolds now that we’ve all played pretty competitive schedules up to this point.”

Brian McInnis covers the state's sports scene for Spectrum News Hawaii.