When you talk about the greatest coaches in fastpitch softball history, Gary Haning—who founded and ran the OC Batbusters’ organization for over three decades, winning numerous national championships and coaching softball greats like Jennie Finch and Laura Berg—would have to be at the top of the list.

Gary, who was the travel ball coach to be inducted into the NFCA Hall of Fame, had a front row seat to the early growth and successes in fastpitch softball, particularly on the West Coast, and how the sport has changed over the last 25 years.

In an exclusive to Line Drive Softball, Coach Haning shares his thoughts on seeing the changes taking place, from it becoming a more nationally balanced sport to the impact of the Transfer Portal, NIL compensation and more…

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As I watched the final game between UCLA and Stanford in the Women’s College World Series earlier this month, I couldn’t help but feel a little nostalgia.

For 25 years, the conference dominated college softball as UCLA won three of the first four NCAA Div. I Championships with only Texas A&M and the monster lefty Lori Stoll breaking through.

UCLA’s combination of the flame throwing rise ball Tracy Compton and the aptly named Debbie Doom, and her disappearing drop and great change-up, were likely the best twosome ever.

Cal State Fullerton won its sole title in 1986 with future long-time coach Kathy Van Wyk giving Judi Garman her DI win after many California JC wins at Golden West College.

During this time, Cal State Northridge was totally dominating DII with Kathy Slaten and Debbie Dickman pitching and players who would have been DI anywhere else.

Slaten, in particular, was an amazing pitcher and very much a free spirit; she could not throw the ball to the infield overhand, so she threw to the bases underhanded! Despite this handicap, CSUN regularly beat the best DI teams and would have been a factor if they had been Division I.

A personal anecdote…

I coached Ontario Christian High for a couple years as a favor to player on my team and it was a great experience as all of the players were from dairy farm homes and they knew what hard work was. The school was in Div 5/6 and we got to the CIF Finals which were held at Lakewood, Calif.

As I walked up to the field, I heard a sound of a ball hitting a glove that sounded like a large firecracker going off.

As I walked around to our side of the field, I saw the source of the noise: it was Kathy Slaten warming up… and I wanted to cry! Our little dairy farmers had never seen anything like her.

We were like 23-2 and had a team batting average well into the .400’s, but I think we only touched the ball twice in the game. It was a shame that Slaten’s defense and some later personal issues prevented her from totally fulfilling her potential, she was incredibly talented.

Texas A&M won again in 1987 with the brilliant NorCal pitcher Shaun Andaya, but from then until 1998—when Fresno St. won its title—every NCAA DI Championship was decided by UCLA and the University of Arizona.

During that time period (1990-1993) Lisa Fernandez, the Michael Jordon of college softball, was at UCLA.

From 1999 to 2012—other than Oklahoma winning it all in 2000 and Michigan in 2015—Pac-12 teams won 11 of the 13 NCAA DI championships during that run with either UCLA or Arizona capturing SEVEN oof them!

There will never be another rivalry like Arizona and UCLA… their battles were always fierce and hard fought.

*** Click HERE to see the complete history of the NCAA DI Softball Championships *** 

These kids grew up playing with and against each other and they were almost all from a small number of teams including the OC Batbusters, Gordon’s Panthers, So Cal Athletics, Cal Raiders, AZ Storm, Cal Cruisers, So Cal Choppers OC Firecrackers or Sorcerers.

Almost all had won multiple national championships at one or two age levels and almost all were recruited by the same schools.

One thing that was MUCH different then was team jumping. There was always a certain amount of this in travel ball and I will admit to participating in it to some extent, but the players back then rarely changed college teams.

In the 1980’s and 1990’s, there were top-level teams at what is now called the ‘mid-major’ level: Cal St Fullerton, Long Beach State, Cal Poly Pomona… all with small budgets and facilities but who competed on an even level with everyone. To their credit, they frequently reached the College World Series and more than held their own.

Fullerton got a nice stadium and I remember kidding Coach Judi Garman about her leaving a very nice setup at Golden West College to practice on grass and play at a Bobby Sox complex.

Additionally, Long Beach has a nice field with some bleachers and conferences such as the Big West, Mountain West and Western Athletic Conference still have good teams, coaches and players but rarely do they get out of Regionals.

In the decade roughly between 2010 and 2020, changes occurred in college softball and college sports. In softball, a major player became the SEC Conference which had the resources and reputations needed to spend on woman’s sports, which is certainly a good thing overall.

At travel ball nationals for many years we would go to the draw praying for a Georgia or a Florida, but that changed pretty quickly around that time.

We started to compete against those players such as “Sally Sue” who had an “Uncle Billy Bob” who had done some pitching, and we began seeing their pitchers who could match ours. That has progressed to today where the once dominant pitching breeding grounds of Southern California has had a difficult time in many cases matching the pitching from other areas across the country, SEC and elsewhere.

When it comes to facilities around the country, one has only to watch the NCAA Regionals and Super Regionals to see the quality of softball facilities around the country which has leveled the playing fields, literally, in many cases.

The progression of softball’s evolution from Pac-12 to SEC to everyone almost having a chance to win it all has now happened on a much larger level and it will never be the same.

It is hard for me to believe that it has been 50 years since the first day I hit ground balls to young girls in Corona, California. I have seen so much on the field and off and I have been blessed to know and coach some incredible people and incredible athletes.

I got to represent the USA on a softball field, and I have made some great friends and had tremendous experiences. I also believe that PGF President Dan Hay and I, as well as the entire PGF board and staff, have done well for the game.

Personally, I have mixed feelings about some recent major changes in college sports: I hate the idea of the Transfer Portal although I have no problem with NLI (Name, Image & Likeness) and student-athlete compensation.

Our travel ball teams won 11 championships and lost in a championship game 10 times, so I obviously have seen some great wins and suffered some soul crushing losses.

All that being what it is, the part of coaching I love is coaching, practicing, watching them learn and grow. We didn’t build from tryouts; we roasted our butts off watching players at tournaments and games.

We certainly did have kids come to us, but the large majority were players we saw and asked to play. The idea of having a bunch of 15-year-olds win in 18U because they were athletes and hard workers was the most fun I ever had.

When that group aged out and won along the way, another group started again.

This is one of my problems with the Transfer Portal: a player leaves, a team just snags another player instead of being able to recruit a player and teach her, and you just build—or more accurately—just assemble a team.

My bigger problem with the Transfer Portal is how it now can affect recruitable athletes. I no longer am actively involved in recruiting, but many coaches of top teams tell me it is more difficult now.

Anyone who has ever been involved with recruiting knows that the process is very difficult on the player and so now, potentially, there is, say for argument’s sake, a second baseman who has been recruited and offered a scholarship, but the interested college program hears about an All-American second baseman looking to transfer.

So what happens?

The scholarship offer to the young recruit goes away and the player ends up somewhere else where, eventually, she is not happy and looks to transfer… and it just goes on and on and on. For me, watching college football is crazy now because half of every team’s roster is seemingly a transfer!

Softball has come so far to today and it looks like there will yet be a lot of changes in the future.

In past years, watching the Women’s College World Championship game on TV used to be dependent on the French Open tennis title match. If there were no rain delays in France, the college softball championship game would show at 10 am on Tuesday morning, that was it.

The sport has blossomed to where it’s a major draw on ESPN, the SEC Network and elsewhere, but there have been concerns too.

In the last five years, we have gone from raiding elementary schools for 12-year-olds to commit as young as the 6^th and 7^th grades (early recruiting) to significantly reducing the number of high school seniors getting placed where they want to go (Transfer Portal).

I hope the powers that be will watch over this in the future to ensure the next quarter century’s growth in fastpitch softball is as amazing as this past one!

— Gary Haning