For the second straight season, the top prize in college softball will head back to Austin as the Texas Longhorns leave the Women’s College World Series as repeat winners, winning back-to-back national championships.
The championship series of this year’s Women’s College World Series saw the first rematch since moving to the best-of-three series between the Longhorns and Texas Tech Red Raiders. And while the Longhorns needed three games to take down the Red Raiders a season ago, they only needed two games this season, sweeping Texas Tech.
The Longhorns landed the first punch in game one on Wednesday, winning 7-3 to open the championship series. And on Thursday night, Texas landed the knockout punch, taking the series with a 4-1 victory over the Red Raiders.
After a full game outing from the Longhorns ace in junior Teagan Kavan, Texas head coach Mike White would turn to a veteran arm in senior Citlaly Gutierrez to start the pivotal game two and face off against the Texas Tech ace in senior NiJaree Canady.
And for the first two innings, the two seniors would keep away two explosive offenses quiet with two scoreless frames. However, the Red Raiders would strike first after an RBI single from Lauren Allred in the third inning of the game.
While the Red Raiders found the breakthrough; the Longhorns would struggle to get anything started against Canady. After a lead-off hit in the first inning, 11 straight Longhorns batters would be retired with Texas not getting its next hit until the fourth inning.
The Longhorns would get themselves into a huge jam after White decided to turn to freshman Hannah Wells to start the fourth inning. While the freshman got two outs in the inning, she would load the bases with Gutierrez needing to reenter and get out of the trouble. And the Longhorns would survive as the senior would induce a lineout to stay alive, trailing by just a run.
And after staying alive in the fourth inning, the Longhorns would be able to knock the door down and take the lead in the fifth inning.
The first two runners would get aboard, and with two outs and the bases loaded, junior Viviana Martinez punched a ball deep into the hole at short, forcing a throwing error from the Red Raiders shortstop that would score two runs.
With the 2-1 lead, the Longhorns would turn to the bullpen for their ace in Kavan, and she would be lights out, striking out the side in order to start her outing in the sixth inning. And while a one-run lead could have been enough for Kavan, Texas wasn’t done scoring.
Junior Kayden Henry would get the pair of insurance runs started with a solo home run to kickstart the frame. And senior Leighann Goode added another with an RBI single, to give Kavan a 4-1 lead heading into the seventh inning.
Kavan would slam the door shut with authority, forcing a groundout and back-to-back strikeouts to seal the deal. The junior ace struck out five of the six batters she faced on her way to earning her second straight national title and earning back-to-back Most Outstanding Player at the Women’s College World Series.
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