ASU softball’s season comes to an end in shutout loss vs. Texas in Super Regional elimination game
With the loss, ASU softball fell one win short of its first appearance in the Women's College World Series since 2018.
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Arizona State softball was unable to muster any offense against Texas in a 5-0 loss in the winner-take-all Game 3 of the Super Regional on Sunday.
ASU could not solve Texas pitcher Teagan Kavan, who tossed a gem against the Sun Devils, striking out five and surrendering five hits in a complete game. With the win, the defending champion Longhorns (47-11) clinched a berth in the Women’s College World Series.
Texas got on the board first in the bottom of the third inning when Katie Stewart hit a two-run single off Kenzie Brown to make it 2-0. Brown was pitching in her third straight game on Sunday. She finished her start with 4 1/3 innings pitched, striking out five while surrendering three runs on six hits and a walk.
The Longhorns added another run off Brown in the fifth, courtesy of shortstop Viviana Martinez. Later in the sixth inning, Stewart hit another two-run single, this time off Meika Lauppe, to make it 5-0. Kavan got the final three outs in the seventh inning to close it out.
Left fielder Yannixa Acuña registered two of the Sun Devils’ five hits in Game 3.
ASU (45-18) finished one win short of its first appearance in the Women’s College World Series since 2018. The Sun Devils, who won Game 1 of the Super Regional, had a late lead in Game 2 on Saturday before Victoria Hunter hit a two-out, two-run homer in the sixth inning that led Texas to a 4-3 win.
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Comments
4 Comments
As I predicted, the exodus from ASU Softball has started with 2 huge names: Meika Lauppe (best pitcher) and Sam Swan (best Non-pitcher) entering the transfer portal. Takyla Davis (IF) & Avery Motroni (C/INF) also entered the portal, neither of them got much playing time last year.
Another website is saying that there is going to be a mass exodus, meaning there are others who will be leaving who will announce in the next couple days.
Holy BLOG DC! It's softball, and the Devils should be happy that they have three National Championships, but their AD cares about using their money for football, basketball, and hockey. The folks at U of A should be way more "bent", as they've won EIGHT Natty's, and since Candrea left, they've been "okay"; clock's ticking on their head coach.
All in all, this was a great season for ASU Softball. I fear ASU will not see its like for a long, long time, if at all, as environmentally, ASU is headed for Sports Waste Land where fans are left to starve and die. While IMHO, while I was happily surprised by the quality of their pitching and especially their Defense this post-season, it turned out that their Achilles Heal, what failed them, was their offense, which clearly wasn't good enough to compete once they got to Super Regionals. I fear that ASU softball is on a severe downhill slide, unless or until the program finds a very rich Sugar Daddy or Momma. Farrington could be a ghost town next year. Something has to happen really soon, or it will be too late.
IMHO, ASU is pretty much guaranteed to lose Meghan Bartlett this year, as she doesn't really have strong ties to ASU, plus there are going to be numerous schools who need a Softball coach and have both the money to provide that coach and as well as staff, as well as NIL money to offer players. Of the 8 teans that qualified to go to Oklahoma City for the Women's College World Series, every one of them has significant budgets to pay coaches including NIL Money which absolutely dwarf anything ASU can offer. While ASU appears not to have any real NIL money, even if they do, that amount is so insignificant they're in complete obfuscation mode, as they refuse to even say how much they have in the aggregate.