We continue our year-end look at the Top 10 Softball Stories of 2024…  Here is the schedule for this list which will run the rest of December and into January 2025, when we’ll publish the No. 1 Softball Story of The Year:

• Top 10 Softball Stories of the Year: #10 – The Alliance to Hold All National Championships In Indy (Dec. 23, 2024)
• Top 10 Softball Stories of the Year: #9 – The State of the Pro Game (Dec. 24, 2024)
• Top 10 Softball Stories of the Year: #8 – The Power of GoFundMe in Softball (Dec. 25, 2024)
• Top 10 Softball Stories of the Year: #7 – The Passing of 2016-17 Gatorade National Player of the Year Taylor Dockins (Dec. 26, 2024)
• Top 10 Softball Stories of the Year: #6 – Oklahoma’s Launch of Love’s Field Raises the Bar For Softball Stadium (Dec. 27, 2024)
• Top 10 Softball Stories of the Year: #5 – Duke Softball Makes The WCWS… In Only Its 7th Year of Play (Dec. 28, 2024)
• Top 10 Softball Stories of the Year: #4 – Jordyn Bahl Redshirts After Season-Ending Injury (Dec. 29, 2024)
• Top 10 Softball Stories of the Year: #3 – The “Killer B’s” – The Bolts & Bombers – Dominate Club Summer Ball (Dec. 30, 2024)
• Top 10 Softball Stories of the Year: #2 – Tue, Dec. 31, 2024
• Top 10 Softball Stories of the Year: #1 – Wed, Jan. 1, 2025

Also, on Friday, Jan. 3, 2025, Line Drive Softball will list all the Top 10 stories together and then on Saturday, Jan. 4th we’ll will run the “Other Stories Considered” List.

For each topic (story), an article that we ran earlier this year on Line Drive Softball or was published by our friend at D1 Softball, Justin McLeod, the Associate Editor and former workmate of mine.

So how were the Top 10 picked?

We looked at what were considered the most memorable and important stories of the year as they impacted the sport. In researching the Top 10, we talked to those at at all levels of softball, including college and travel ball coaches, other media members and YOU—the fastpitch community.

— Brentt Eads/Line Drive Softball

*****

#2… Oklahoma Sooners Make It Four NCAA D1 Championships in a Row (Dec. 31, 2024)

On June 6, 2024, the Oklahoma Sooners made softball history, winning its fourth straight NCAA D1 title.

It was also the eighth overall softball championship for OU, tying the school with Arizona for the second most ever—UCLA has won a total of 13, but, interestingly, there were no streaks more than two years.

In college sports history, there have been longer championship streaks… for example:

• The North Carolina women’s soccer team won nine titles in a row from 1986 through 1994.
• UCLA men’s basketball won seven consecutive titles from 1967-1973 under legendary coach John Wooden.
• The North Dakota State Bisons won five straight Div. I FCS football titles between 2011-2015.

But in college softball, Oklahoma now holds the record at four straight and will be going for 5 in a row in 2025.

“It’s never been done before,” says D1 Softball’s Justin McLeod. “That alone tells you how difficult and impressive it is. Oklahoma made winning the national championship look so easy for so long that they almost understated what winning four in a row looks like.”

“I said this in an article earlier this week, but there are five young women— Jayda Coleman, Tiare Jennings, Kinzie Hansen, Nicole May, and Rylie Boone—that literally do not know what it’s like to end their college season with a loss… because they never did it!”

Below are two articles detailing their record-setting fourth title that happened on June 6, 2024, as the Sooners beat Texas in a rematch of the 2022 Women’s College World Series.

And a tip of the cap to Head Coach Patty Gasso, who won her eighth national title this year, to tie Mike Candrea of Arizona for the most by a coach in Div. 1 softball history.

*****

Originally published June 6, 2024, on D1Softball.com.

They announced themselves with a record-breaking first inning when college softball returned from a lost season. They pulled off two great escapes in their first World Series. They played their supporting roles to perfection during a record-breaking home run chase. They did everything but pour the concrete and write the check for the softball palace that opened this spring. 

They did everything it’s possible to do in college softball—in college sports. Except lose. 

Oklahoma’s senior class never did figure out what that’s all about. 

“They all have wonderful things ahead of them,” Sooners head coach Patty Gasso said.

“They’ve cemented this program in history. They’ve cemented themselves in history. History can change, but these guys will never, ever be forgotten.”

Completing the most successful four-year run in NCAA softball history, Oklahoma beat rival and worthy challenger Texas 8-4 to sweep the best-of-three championship series and win the Women’s College World Series for the fourth year in a row. Rylie Boone, Jayda Coleman, Kinzie Hansen, Tiare Jennings and Nicole May, the players who were around for all four titles, completed a four-year run in which the Sooners went 235-15 overall, the best winning percentage in Division I history, and 21-4 in the WCWS. 

For what it’s worth, that’s more World Series wins in four seasons than any of Arizona State, Michigan, Oklahoma State or Tennessee have in their respective histories. 

The newest “senior,” sixth-year transfer Kelly Maxwell was in the circle to close out Oklahoma’s eighth national title. Named WCWS Most Outstanding Player, she went 4-0 with a 1.81 ERA in 27 innings for the week. 

“This postseason, especially the World Series, Kelly will be changed forever,” Gasso said. “That is the greatest gift she could give us. Not the championship, but watching this young lady break out of her shell and smile and laugh and just enjoy being a good pitcher with good players who really appreciate and respect her.”

Boone went 3-for-3 and scored two runs in her farewell. And as if anyone needed reminding that Oklahoma isn’t going away anytime soon, freshman Kasidi Pickering went 2-for-3 with a home run and two RBIs. 

FOUR-PEAT COMPLETE 🏆🏆🏆🏆#WCWS x 🎥 ESPN / @OU_Softball pic.twitter.com/Pu5TYx2Msh

— NCAA Softball (@NCAASoftball) June 7, 2024

Player of the Game

Cydney Sanders.

More shortly on how Oklahoma’s three-run rally in the bottom of the third summed up an entire era of dominance. But let’s start with the person who made it a three-run rally. The Sooners had a lot of big hits and a lot of heroes, but after Texas took a 3-2 lead in the top of the fourth inning, Sanders’ bases-clearing three-run double in the bottom of the inning gave them a lead they never relinquished en route to the fourth consecutive title. 

Cyd Strikes 💥

📺 ESPN#ChampionshipMindset | @SandersCydney pic.twitter.com/pWe45GOBOp

— Oklahoma Softball (@OU_Softball) June 7, 2024

Patty Gasso loves to tout Sanders’ defense at first base, perhaps to take some offensive pressure off the Arizona State transfer who has endured some feast-or-famine stretches at the plate. And Sanders was indeed quietly excellent with the glove in Game 2.

She helped defuse a potential big inning early on with a terrific pick of a Tiare Jennings throw in the dirt. She was alert and applied the tag on Mia Scott’s game-changing baserunning miscue in the sixth. But after entering the night with 15 home runs and just 14 other hits this season, Sanders didn’t need to leave the yard to produce the loudest hit of the night. 

The Game Turned When… 

Oklahoma handed a lead to Kelly Maxwell. Yes, that’s about what Maxwell did after entering with runners on second and third base, two outs and a two-run lead in the bottom of the sixth inning. 

The most important thing she did was alert second baseman Avery Hodge that Texas’ Scott had strayed off first base after the Longhorns star cut the deficit to one run with an infield hit against Maxwell. Hodge flipped the ball to Sanders for the pickoff and the Sooners were out of the jam with the lead intact.  

mia scott oh no 😭😭

what a wild mistake for texas with the tying run on third. heads up by oklahoma though #wcws pic.twitter.com/ui4KAqpDx4

— Logan (@loganstephens24) June 7, 2024

“No one feels worse than Mia Scott right now,” Texas coach Mike White said. “Everything happens for a reason. She’s cheeky. That’s part of her MO. That’s what she does. … It was a big moment in that game. Everybody knows it. She’s already beaten herself up. I know she is. Hopefully she learns from that. That’s part of how she is. She’s really aggressive. Pushes the envelope a lot of times. This time it didn’t work out.”

But this is also about how the Sooners got to that moment, how they got the ball to Maxwell—with just about every pitcher on the roster acting as a relay team to get through the first five-plus innings. After throwing more than 250 pitches over the previous two days, Maxwell had limited innings in her for Game 2. But if the Sooners could get her a lead in the late innings, Gasso made it pretty clear in her in-game interview that she was willing to use her to try and finish matters before any Game 3. 

Karlie Keeney had thrown just seven pitches in the World Series and just four innings across four tournament appearances. Starting All-American Michelle Gascoigne instead of Keilani Ricketts in Game 2 in 2013 was one thing. Starting Alex Storako instead of Jordy Bahl in Game 2 a year ago was logical. Starting Keeney was Gasso sticking her thumb in the eye of conventional wisdom. 

Keeney was hardly perfect, walking four and giving up two runs, but she got through 2.2 innings. She didn’t let the game get away—with some help from Patyn Monticelli, who after pitching just twice since March, relived Keeney and got out of a bases-loaded jam in the third. 

After Kierston Deal did her part with an inning out of the bullpen, senior Nicole May—always in the shadow of the latest shiny ace—was simply brilliant in striking out four of the seven batters she faced. Only then, with the final stretch in sight, did the Sooners call on Maxwell to get them across the finish line.

‘This is one of the most enjoyable games I’ve ever been a part of because of that,” Gasso said of the approach. “We have not done this this season. We knew we couldn’t throw Kelly. We just can’t. I did that one time with a girl named Paige Parker. I’d never do it again. It wasn’t worth it.

“It was exactly planned out, and it worked exactly how it was supposed to.”

Explaining Oklahoma in an Inning

As much as the seniors and the potential for the four-peat defined this season, this was a team that had to find an identity separate from what came before. Jocelyn Alo, G Juarez, Jordy Bahl and others were always part of the conversation, but they weren’t in the dugout. Only the standard they helped this year’s seniors set remained. 

It’s little wonder Gasso called it far and away the most difficult season of the four, with little disagreement from her players.

“Honestly the whole season was tough,” Jayda Coleman said. “For me personally, I know I had very high expectations. Even right off the bat playing our first game, I felt the pressure. I felt the expectations. As we went on, if we lost one game, two games, lost to Texas, everyone had an opinion about us. It was frustrating just to see everyone on Twitter, TikTok hoping anybody else but us.”

That’s also what made the rally that culminated in Sanders’ bases-loaded double so perfectly cast. 

Oklahoma trailed 3-2 when the bottom of the fourth began, after Texas had taken the lead for the second time in the top of the inning. With one out, Hansen hit a wedge shot of a single into short left field, not quite as commanding a hit as her extra-base bonanza in Game 1. Pickering followed with a single off the end of her bat, the ball falling primarily because the freshman’s home run earlier in the game meant the Texas outfield was playing near the fence. And defending the plate on an 0-2 count, Boone beat out an infield single to load the bases. Sanders’ double was the first hard hit in the inning.

Not exactly a fireworks show from a team that still ranked second in Division I this season with a .650 slugging percentage—but also checked in below its marks of .778 (2021), .734 (2022) and .666 (2023). The crooked numbers weren’t quite as crooked in 2024, the run-rule wins not quite as plentiful. The team that lost at home to Louisiana and BYU and lost series against Texas and Oklahoma State wasn’t quite as invincible as in seasons past. 

Hansen and Boone were around the last time an Oklahoma season ended with anything other than the team lifting the national championship trophy. In a year in which no team lifted the trophy, Hansen scored Oklahoma’s final run in 2020—a walk-off run to beat Missouri State in extra innings, a few days before sports shut down amid the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Coleman, May and Jennings hadn’t even arrived yet. Those Sooners weren’t the team that would open the 2021 season with a 29-0 win against UTEP, with Hansen hitting one of five home runs in the first inning. 

Pickering was a high school sophomore in Humble, Texas, when the Sooners opened this era with that record-breaking win. Sanders was a high school junior headed to Arizona State. 

Those disparate parts had to come together this season. They had to fit together. This wasn’t a juggernaut that remained the same for four years. It was transfers, freshmen trying to earn time, sophomores trying to earn more time and, yes, perhaps the most special “class,” if we use the term loosely enough to include Boone and Hansen, that we’ve ever seen. 

As time goes on, we’ll inevitably file this season under the “more of the same” heading. Just Oklahoma being Oklahoma for the fourth year in a row. 

But this team, the 2024 champions, were never more themselves than when old, new and everything in-between put together the most pragmatic of crooked-number rallies in the fourth.

Next in Line

No one doubts Alyssa Washington’s importance to the Longhorns. But even without the senior captain next season, and with all the now-necessary caveats for any team when it comes to the transfer portal, this felt much more like the beginning of something for Texas than the surprise run to the championship series two seasons ago.

Mike White made mention of the fact that Texas only had one All-American, Atwood, but he clearly believed that said more about the voting process than the talent on his roster. As they enter the SEC, the Longhorns are loaded. A lineup with Atwood, Scott, Viviana Martinez, Kayden Henry and Katie Stewart, among others, has every opportunity to have this time right back at No. 1 next season. 

They also lose relatively little in the circle, as important as Estelle Czech was on two WCWS teams. But it was noteworthy that White focused on growth from the likes of Teagan Kavan, Mac Morgan and Citlaly Gutierrez as the key to 2025. 

“We didn’t have a superstar pitcher; we had a pitching staff,” White said. “As great as that pitching staff was, they were one-dimensional. We have to work on that. They have to come out and throw different pitches at different locations as a separate player, as opposed to a unit.”

“We had the stuff as a unit, but it hurt us because people were able to adjust and sit on us. That’s the biggest difference.”

Key Moments 

Top of the first: Avery Hodge wasn’t the biggest OU name entering the World Series. But the fill-in second baseman hasn’t wasted the opportunity to change that. Texas got off to a good start against surprise starter Karlie Keeney with Bella Dayton’s leadoff walk. But after a Mia Scott fly out, Hodge turned a nifty 4-3 double play on Viviana Martinez’s grounder up the middle. 

Bottom of the first: Martinez quickly got even, turning an inning-ending 6-3 double play on Ella Parker’s grounder to the shortstop side of second base. It was Texas’ third double play of the World Series, all started by Martinez. 

Top of the second: Texas didn’t waste a second consecutive leadoff walk. After earning that walk, Atwood got the best of her counterpart behind the plate by stealing second on a ball that Kinzie Hansen had to go to her knees to corral. That mattered when Kayden Henry poked a two-out, two-strike single into right. Running from second, Atwood slid in with the opening run. Keeney stranded runners on second and third to escape further damage. Texas 1, OU 0. 

Bottom of the second: Alyssa Brito nearly answered on the first pitch of the inning, driving a ball off the center-field fence for a double. Hansen moved her over to third, but Kasidi Pickering wasn’t interested in any sacrifice fly balls. She caught a Mac Morgan drop ball and drove it out to left for a two-run home run—just the sixth Morgan allowed this season. 

The Sooners were building toward more, but Texas successfully challenged that Rylie Boone left first base early on what would have been ball four to Hodge. OU 2, Texas 1. 

Top of the third: Keeney got two quick outs, but Texas made full use of its third out. Back-to-back singles from Martinez and Atwood and a Katie Stewart walk loaded the bases, and Alyssa Washington played the captain’s role to perfection with a game-tying single. 

If Gasso starting Keeney was a surprise, the coach one-upped herself by going to Paytn Monticelli with the bases still loaded. The tall righty hadn’t pitched since May 9 and had thrown just 2.2 inning since March. Genius or luck, the move delivered the desired result, as Monticelli retired Joley Mitchell to leave the bases loaded. OU 2, Texas 2. 

Bottom of the third: Hodge poked an 0-2 pitch into left for a leadoff single, which was the end for Morgan in the circle. For the second night in a row, Estelle Czech came out of the bullpen. 

Top of the fourth: Monticelli’s big out in the previous inning turned out to be her only out, as lefty Kierston Deal took over in the circle to begin the fourth. Kayden Henry greeted her with a leadoff single, stole second and eventually moved to third, but Deal was still one out from escaping when Scott’s hard grounder wrong-footed Hodge at second base. The error meant that it was OU, third in the nation in defense, allowing the game’s first unearned run. Texas 3, OU 2. 

Bottom of the fourth: The Sooners and Longhorns refused to let any half inning pass without drama. Here, the Sooners loaded the bases on back-to-back-to-back one-out singles from Pickering, Hansen and Boone, none of them hit particularly hard off Czech. But they weren’t on base for long. Whatever the inning’s other hits lacked in oomph, Cydney Sanders made up for it by hammering a bases-clearing double into the gap. For Sanders, it was just her 15th hit this season that wasn’t a home run (she has 15 of those, too). OU 5, Texas 3. 

Top of the sixth: Texas wasn’t going without a fight. Ashton Maloney’s one-out double was the first hit off May and put the tying run in scoring position following Mitchell’s leadoff walk. May struck out Dayton for the second out, but her fourth strikeout was her final contribution before handing the ball to Kelly Maxwell. 

Which is where things got weird. Hodge couldn’t make a play on Mia Scott’s grounder on the first base side of the 3-4 hole, allowing the lead Texas runner to score from third. But perhaps trying to distract Hodge and give the second runner time to come home, Scott strayed from first base. Alerted by Maxwell, Hodge deftly, almost casually, flipped the ball behind her to Sanders for the inning-end out.  OU 5, Texas 4. 

Bottom of the sixth: The Sooners had their ace’s back one more time, scoring three insurance runs to make the final inning feel a bit more like a coronation. OU 8, Texas 4. 

*****

FOUR PEAT COMPLETE: Sooners Claim Eighth National Title

Originally posted June 6 on SoonerSports.com

OKLAHOMA CITY, Okla. – There’s only one Oklahoma. There’s also only one softball program to win four straight NCAA championships.

The Sooners officially capped the most dominant four-year span in Division I history Thursday night with an 8-4 victory over rival Texas at the Women’s College World Series.

The clincher came in Game Two of the best-of-three championship series before a crazed sellout crowd of 12,324 at Devon Park.

OU has now won eight national crowns all-time and six of the last eight.

For good measure, the Sooners have now beaten Texas 33 times in the last 36 meetings and are 6-0 against the Longhorns in the WCWS.

For those in the OU party who claimed their fourth straight national title, this year’s championship ring undoubtedly was the tightest fit.

After last season’s 61-1 magic carpet ride to the crown, this year’s journey was much bumpier.

Although departing seniors Tiare Jennings, Jayda Coleman, Kinzie Hansen, Rylie Boone and Nicole May never lost their final game of any season, doubters came from all directions in 2024 — including inside state lines. 

“We fought all season,” Hansen said. “Everybody had something to say about us all the time. People counted us out. It was just a grind — mentally, physically. We fought the whole year. It was all so worth it in this moment.”

Coleman added,

“Honestly, the whole season was tough. As we went on, if we lost one game, two games, lost to Texas, everyone had an opinion about us. It was frustrating just to see everyone on Twitter, TikTok hoping anybody else but us. That didn’t happen, so. …”

Head coach Patty Gasso admitted the degree of difficulty was high for her Sooners.

“People say, ‘Let’s go win one.’ You’re like, ‘OK.’ It’s not like that. It’s very difficult,” Gasso said.

“Everything has to go right. The thing about them is they’re resilient. They have a lot of pride in that. With that, it’s hard for me to comprehend. I continue to say this one was the hardest to manage.

“It wasn’t easy, this season. I hear them (my players) and I agree. It’s probably the hardest coaching season that I’ve had in a while because of a lot of the naysayers, a lot of … I don’t know. It’s heavy. I don’t know how to explain how heavy. Heavy is a head that wears the crown is the one thing that really stuck out. That really has felt true. It’s been exhausting.”

In terms of pitching, Thursday’s title game was uncharacteristically chaotic. OU (59-7) and Texas (55-10) both pitched by committee, combining to use eight pitchers.

For the first 17 outs, the Sooners sent four pitchers to the circle.

Right-hander Karlie Keeney started, was relieved by righty Paytn Monticelli, who was followed by lefty Kierston Deal, and then came righty May.

Monticelli was making her first appearance since May 9 and just her fourth appearance since March. The Wisconsin transfer got out of the jam with a ground-out to first base.

May’s most recent appearance came in a 9-3 semifinal loss to Florida, during which she surrendered six hits and four runs (all earned) in the first 2.0 innings.

On this night, however, May performed commendably after starting the top of the fifth. In 1.2 innings, she yielded one hit and struck out four of the seven batters she faced.

With two outs, runners at second and third and OU clinging to a 5-3 lead in the top of the sixth inning, it was Kelly Maxwell’s turn.

If it’s physically possible to breathe a sigh of relief while simultaneously screaming your lungs out, that’s precisely what the Sooner faithful did as Maxwell emerged from the left-field corner bullpen.

“This is one of the most enjoyable games I’ve ever been a part of because of that,” Gasso said of her revolving door of pitchers. “It was exactly planned out, and it worked exactly how it was supposed to, to a T, to a T.”

Maxwell would face just one batter in the sixth. What transpired was, to say the least, an adventure.

Mia Scott’s short-hop grounder to second base bounced out of Avery Hodge’s glove and Scott was safe at first.

After UT’s Joley Mitchell had scored from third to make it 5-4, not only did Scott fail to simply return to first base, she also inexplicably took two slow steps toward second while standing behind OU first baseman Cydney Sanders.

Hodge still had the ball and quickly flipped it to Sanders, who tagged out Scott to end the inning, stranding the tying run at third.

UT’s last run was credited to May. Amazingly, it was the first run in relief May had allowed since February of her sophomore season.

In the bottom half of the sixth, the Sooners’ offense tacked on three lethal runs on three hits and, even though they left three on base, still managed to double-up the Longhorns by a score of 8-4.

Maxwell, who was an obvious pick as the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player, calmly snuffed out Texas batters in order in the seventh to seal the deal.

The southpaw was joined by Hansen, Jennings, Ella Parker and Kasidi Pickering on the WCWS All-Tournament team as part of a tournament-leading five OU selections.

In the end, Sooner Magic had conjoined with Maxwell Magic.

Maxwell transferred from Oklahoma State after last season, but for the Sooners she was heaven-sent.

“It’s been awesome,” Maxwell said. “This whole team, they’re special. I’m just thankful that I got to be a part of this.”

Deal (14-1) got the win. UT pitcher Estelle Czech (8-4), who was one of two pitchers to beat the Sooners 2-1 in early April, took the loss.

Texas entered the game with a 43-0 record when scoring first this season. The Longhorns took a 1-0 lead in the top of the second but ended up finishing the season 43-1 under such circumstances.

Freshman outfielder Kasidi Pickering launched a two-run, opposite field home run to left in the bottom of the second to put OU in front 2-1.

Texas tied the score at 2 in the third and took a 3-2 lead in the fourth. The Sooners took the lead for good with three runs in the fourth coming on four hits. An OU three-spot in the sixth provided the final insurance needed to secure the title.

“These players are exhausted, but they keep going,” Gasso said. “It’s the love for each other. It’s the love for the game. It’s the love for the university. But they’re elite athletes who have extreme passion.”

— John Rohde/SoonerSports.com contributor