INCOMING MISSILE : FRESHMAN HAS FAMOUS FASTBALL.

Byline: Eric Sondheimer

Christa Williams is a Southern belle from the heart of Texas armed with the most powerful fastball since the days of Nolan Ryan.

Williams is only 18 and already owns a gold medal. No incoming UCLA women's sports recruit from the past - not Jackie Joyner Kersee, not Ann Meyers Drysdale, not even Lisa Fernandez - has arrived in Westwood with the kind of glittering resume Williams has accumulated.

``She has the potential to put herself in a very special place in our history books,'' Bruins co-softball coach Sue Enquist said.

While gymnastics hero Kerri Strug gets plenty of stares walking around UCLA's campus these days, Williams is another young Olympic hero perfectly positioned to become a sports celebrity.

Last summer in Atlanta, she won two games while pitching for the gold-medal-winning Olympic softball team. Forget that she had just graduated from Dobie High School in Houston, Texas, and was like a baby in diapers competing against the best women softball players in the world.

And yet, with all the pomp and circumstance, with all the pressure and expectations, she passed her test on the world stage with an A+. It only made those who took the risk of selecting a high school senior to the U.S. Olympic softball team look even more brilliant.

Then again, anyone familiar with women's softball has known about Williams since she was a 15-year-old freshman phenom in Houston. By the time she left the city last April to travel full-time with her Olympic teammates, she was getting recognized in Houston restaurants, at the airport and on the street by those wanting to meet her or just say hello.

She is a teen-age girls' sports hero whose high school-career pitching record was 89-6 with 1,243 strikeouts. In one 19-inning game, she struck out 32 batters. Her rise ball has been clocked at 71 mph, so fast that few others in college can equal it.

Every college softball program in the nation wanted her. She narrowed her list of schools to UCLA, Arizona, Cal State Fullerton and Texas. Her parents wanted her to go to Texas or Arizona, but for the first time, she said she went against her parents' wishes and chose UCLA.

``I fell in love with how the team treated me and how the team treated themselves,'' she said. ``The tradition of academics and sports put it over the top.''

Enquist remembers the night Williams called with the news.

``I got very tense because she was very quiet and I know that tone,'' she said. ``She had the tone of athletes who don't pick UCLA. My heart dropped for a moment. When she told me she wanted to become a Bruin, I tried to contain myself. She is definitely one of the greatest signings we've had. No one will ever come in as decorated as Christa Williams.''

There's nothing that tips off people to Williams' Southern roots other than when she says, ``You-all'' or ``fixin' to do something.'' She started playing softball when she was 8 and remembers always throwing the ball hard. To say she's a perfectionist would be an understatement.

``Oh yeah,'' she said. ``I'm a perfectionist. I'll pitch seven games in a day or 10, it doesn't matter. Whatever is going to make the team win, I'll do.''

The chance to compete in the Olympic Games as a teen-ager before she started college provided Williams with invaluable experience.

``I'm a person who changed in how much I can handle stress,'' she said. ``I feel I've been through everything I can possibly go through. I've gained such an experience in life and softball.''

No bigger lesson was learned than when she sat in the dugout and watched the supposedly invincible Lisa Fernandez give up a home run to the No. 9 batter in a U.S. loss to Australia.

``She made one mistake the entire game and the one mistake cost the team,'' Williams said. ``It's like a team effort and I felt so helpless. I cried and cried and cried and not because we lost. I couldn't help her. It was one of those things, we should have won the game but didn't. It goes to show you the game is never in the bag and you can't just get away throwing hard heat down the middle.''

Now Fernandez, a former Honda Cup Award winner as the top athlete in women's collegiate sports, is teaching Williams all her tricks as UCLA's pitching coach. Imagine how good Williams could become with Fernandez as her mentor.

``She's going to be able to push me to the edge and make me a better pitcher,'' Williams said.

Enquist has been impressed with how well Williams fits in on campus.

``You don't get the impression she's this huge talent, this great Olympian,'' she said. ``She comes across as a wide-eyed freshman at UCLA. That makes for good chemistry. She will go out to a dirt lot and throw against a wall if she has to. Nothing is beneath her. If it means throwing out to a net without a catcher until her hands are bloody, she'll do it.''

If Williams wasn't so involved in softball, she'd probably focus on becoming a lawyer because she's never one to keep quiet in the background.

``I like to debate things,'' she said. ``I feel I can research things to make sure you're telling the truth and if there's one little glitch you're saying to me, then I'll get it.''

Ready or not, Williams is about to become a role model for young girl athletes.

``It's a huge responsibility,'' he said. ``I hope I do everything right at the right times.''

MEMO: Deputy Sports Editor Eric Sondheimer's column appears Tuesdays in the Daily News.

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Photo: (color) Softball pitcher Christa Williams enters UCL A with a big reputation plus a gold medal from the Atlanta Games.

Bob Halvorsen / Daily News