The little things that earned Washington a bid into last season’s Women’s College World Series — sacrifice bunts, execution with runners in scoring position — were often missing this year, resulting in a less-than-intimidating Pac-10 record and a lower seed in the NCAA tournament.

The Washington softball team’s season ended yesterday at the Houston Regional for much of the same reason.

The Huskies fell 2-1 to Houston in the championship round after getting one hit off the Cougars Saturday, ending the UW’s season in the regional round for the first time since 2002. Houston (53-9) moves on to host next weekend’s Super Regional round against the winner of LSU vs. Louisiana-Lafayette.

The Dawgs took their opening round game from Texas 2-1 on an Ashlyn Watson RBI single in the bottom of the seventh inning. But the Dawgs dropped into the loser’s bracket after Angel Shamblin, Houston’s ace pitcher, tossed a one-hit shutout en route to a 2-0 Houston victory on Saturday.

Washington (30-25-1) topped Texas again 5-3 Saturday evening to advance to the title game.

Shamblin also picked up the win in the championship game, allowing just two hits and one run — a homerun off the bat of Morgan Stuart with one out in the seventh inning.

“It wasn’t so much not hitting as it was we just didn’t execute,” said UW coach Heather Tarr, who is now 16-9 in postseason play. “We had a bunch of bunt opportunities we didn’t get down. We didn’t give ourselves any opportunities to capitalize.”

As explosive as Houston’s offense has been this season, it didn’t necessarily live up to those expectations. Senior pitcher Caitlin Noble pitched brilliantly in her final game as a Husky, allowing only three hits over the 5 2/3 innings that she pitched in the championship game. But a solo home run by Haley Valis in the fifth inning put the Cougars on top 1-0, and freshman pitcher Aleah Macon walked three consecutive batters in the sixth inning to force what proved to be the deciding run.

“Caitlin was awesome,” Tarr said of her lone senior. “She really was just able to keep her composure. I started her on Friday [against Texas] because we thought that she had the experience, and she made good on it.”

Unfortunately for the Huskies, Shamblin was even better. The Cougars’ ace improved her season record to 35-3, allowing just three hits over 14 innings against Washington.

“I definitely think we could have won both games [against Houston],” Tarr said. “Their pitcher is pretty good. She has a lot of things she can go to. It was kind of too little too late for us [Sunday]. But I think we could have won both games.”

Instead, the Huskies will head home to begin a long off-season in preparation for another postseason run next year. Washington loses just one player, Noble, and returns All-Americans Danielle Lawrie (red-shirting while competing with the Canadian national team) and Ashley Charters (surgery to repair a torn labrum) as well as power-hitting outfielder Lauren Greer (shoulder surgery), along with its entire starting lineup.

“We have a lot of young players who learned a lot this year,” Tarr said. “Freshmen got a lot of opportunities to learn this year, so we’re going to be much better because of that.”

They’ll have to wait until next year to find out.