Pitcher throws perfect game, yet loses

A perfect game should be reason to celebrate, a career accomplishment at any level. For a California high school senior, though, her perfect outing ended in a loss.

Facing Camarillo (Calif.) in the Thousand Oaks Tournament final on Saturday, Rachel Garcia of Highland (Palmdale, Calif.) struck out 23 batters over eight innings, including the first 18 batters she faced, according to the Los Angeles Daily News.

Camarillo put in a strong performance of its own, holding Highland scoreless through regulation. Center fielder Sarah Urrea dove into the fence to save what could have been a game-winning home run.

California plays with the international tiebreaker rule, which automatically puts a runner at second base at the beginning of each inning once a game is in extras, so Camarillo started the top of the eighth with its first baserunner of the day.

At that point, Garcia made her only mistake of the day: she threw a wild pitch. That let the baserunner reach third. The catcher tried to throw her out, but overthrew third base, allowing the runner to score. Highland didn't answer in the bottom of the inning, and the game ended at 1-0.

"It's pretty tough obviously," Garcia told the Los Angeles Daily News. "We're just going to learn from it and go on to the next game."

According to Max Preps, Garcia is one of the best pitchers in the country, having thrown 256 strikeouts in 113 innings this season. She has a 0.31 ERA. Overall, she's 78-13, with 1,153 strikeouts in her high school career. She was named the state's Gatorade Softball Player of the year as a junior.

It's an unfortunate ending to an otherwise phenomenal performance. She'll bring her talents to UCLA next year.

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Danielle Elliot is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Contact her at delliot@yahoo-inc.com or find her onTwitter and Facebook.