SAN DIEGO – San Diego State softball head coach Stacey Nuveman Deniz announced her team’s four signees for the freshman class of 2027 on Wednesday, National Signing Day.
The reigning Mountain West Tournament champions will be adding Californians Ysabella Granata, McKena Harvey, Ella Kim and Zoey Thomas for the 2027 season, the Aztecs’ first in the Pac-12 conference.
A catcher and infielder from Galt, Granata has lettered in all three seasons so far at Liberty Ranch High. She is a two-year captain for the Hawks and has helped the team to a pair of league championships as well as a second-place finish. The league MVP as a freshman, Granata was nominated for the all-state team as a sophomore before being selected to the MaxPreps All-Sac-Joaquin Section Team during her junior season last spring. Granata has also excelled in the classroom, making the honor roll in each of her four years. In addition to playing for Liberty Ranch, she has also competed for four club teams: Universal Fastpitch (Martinez, Calif.), Sorcerers (Brentwood, Calif.), Lady Magic (Vacaville, Calif.) and NorCal Rising (Vacaville, Calif.).
Harvey is a two-way player from Oroville. She played her first two seasons of high school at Las Plumas High, leading the team to a pair of league titles while serving as a captain in her second season. A two-time all-league MVP at Las Plumas, she transferred to Chico High, sitting out her junior year. As a freshman, Harvey posted a 1.12 ERA with 172 strikeouts in the circle while hitting .463 with a 1.385 OPS and eight home runs. The next year, she struck out 155 batters with a 1.55 ERA and hit .451 with a 1.153 OPS and two home runs. Harvey has played for five club teams. She played for NorCal Rising and Lady Magic from Vacaville, California, as well as LTG (Elk Grove, Calif.). Harvey won the 2022 Colorado Sparkler 14u in 2022 while competing for the Sorcerers (Brentwood, Calif.). Her longest tenure was two years for the Firecrackers from Rancho Cordova, California. In 2024, Extra Inning Softball ranked her the No. 6 pitcher in the country and first on the West Coast, also placing Harvey on their Second Team.
Coming from Fountain Valley High in Fountain Valley, Kim is a backstop. After missing her freshman season due to injury, Kim stormed onto the scene as a sophomore, garnering second-team all-league accolades. She moved up to the first team as a junior, also earning Defensive MVP. During her junior season last spring, she hit .493 and reached base at a .557 clip, driving in 29 runs and homering five times. Kim played for the Explosion (Huntington Beach, Calif.) for three seasons. In 2023, she was a member of the USA U15 Junior Women’s National Team, winning the gold medal in the Utsugi Cup. Last season, Kim was named a PGF All-American Finalist.
An infielder from Fresno, Thomas plays at Clovis North High. She is a four-year letterwinner, helping her team to a Tri River Athletic Conference championship as a freshman before winning the CIF Central Section at the DI level in both her sophomore and junior seasons. The three-time all-conference first team selection has a career .356 batting average, .433 on-base percentage, 94 hits, 66 RBIs and 53 runs scored across 87 games in high school. Thomas played five years of club ball for Unity Ricks/Johnson. Last spring, she was named the Fresno Bee Large School Player of the Year and earned a spot on the Cal Hi Sports All-State First Team.
Last year, the Aztecs posted a 38-19 record including a 16-6 mark during conference play. SDSU hosted the Mountain West Tournament as the 2024 regular season and tournament champions and won four straight elimination games to win another title. San Diego State picked up a dramatic 3-2 win against Arizona State to open the NCAA Los Angeles Regional. The 2026 Aztec softball season will open up with the SDSU Season Kickoff tournament, held at SDSU Softball Stadium from February 6-8.