Women’s College world series recap

On June 9th, 2022 the Oklahoma Sooners defeated the Texas Longhorns 10 to 5  to win the Women’s College World Series for the 2nd straight year in a row. This concluded the 2022 college softball season. In this article I will be providing a recap of the Women’s College World Series. The NCAA Division Softball tournament bracket was stacked with 64 teams competing to make it to Oklahoma City where the final 8 teams would compete for the 2022 Women’s College World Series. The Sooners had an easy ride to Oklahoma City but not every team did. A Lot of teams like Florida, Texas and Northwestern had to battle top ranked teams in the super regional tournament to make it to Oklahoma City. Northwestern, the number 9 seed has to battle the number 8 seeded Arizona St Sun Devils in best of 3 series to punch their ticket to Oklahoma City. The Wildcats of Northwestern barely escaped with a ticket to Oklahoma City defeating the Sun Devils 2 to 1 in the series. The Florida Gators had a very tough fight against the number 3 Virginia Tech Hokies in a best of 3 series to punch their ticket to Oklahoma City. Florida took Virginia Tech in the 3rd game defeating the Hokies 12 to 0 to punch their ticket into Oklahoma City. Unranked Texas had to defeat the number 4 seeded Arkansas Razorbacks to punch their ticket to OKC in a best of 3 series. Texas took Arkansas into game 3 defeating the Razorbacks 3 to 0. 

The Women’s College World Series final 8 teams remained. The number one seed Oklahoma Sooners, the number 5 seed UCLA Bruins, the number 7 seed Oklahoma St Cowgirls, the number 9 seed Northwestern Wildcats, the number 14 Florida Gators, and the unranked Arizona Wildcats, the unranked Texas Longhorns, and the unranked Oregon St Beavers. Game one was Northwestern vs Oklahoma. This was Northwestern’s first time in the Women’s College World Series since 2007. Northwestern had a very successful season winning the Big Ten Conference Regular Season Champions and only losing 9 games during the regular season. This was Oklahoma’s toughest opponent yet. But they did not care, Oklahoma let Northwestern hang around for the first two innings then had a 6 run 3rd inning to take a 6 to 1 lead. Then they sent the Wildcats to the losers bracket defeating them 13 to 2. The next game was UCLA vs Texas. UCLA being a 5 seed and Texas being unranked Texas was an underdog especially facing an All American and PAC 12 pitcher of the year  Megan Faraimo. But the Longhorns just played their normal ball and ended up defeating the Bruins 7 to 2. May I note that Texas was the only team to defeat the Sooners in the regular season. The next game was Florida vs Oregon St. The Beavers scored 1 run early in the first inning but were unable to get the bats going the rest of the game and Florida walked away with an easy 7 to 1 win.The next game was Oklahoma St vs Arizona. Arizona being unranked were an underdog. The Cowgirls took a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the 4th. Arizona fought back putting 2 runs on the board in the 5th. It is 2-1 Wildcats going into the 6th and the Cowgirls manage to score 3 runs and end up advancing to the next game in the winners bracket vs Florida and sending Arizona to the losers bracket to play Texas. The next game was Northwestern vs UCLA. Northwestern had previously defeated UCLA early in the regular season back on February 18th. Northwestern won that game on a walk off home run and this was the biggest moment of the Wildcats season. This game was win or go home so it was a very tense game for both teams. UCLA took an early 1-0  first inning lead. Northwestern was unable to get the bats going against the All American Megan Faraimo. UCLA ended up crushing Northwestern with 4 runs in the last two innings and defeating the Wildcats 6-1. Thus ending the amazing season for Northwestern. The next game was the Oregon St Beavers vs the Arizona Wildcats. This game was also a win or go home situation for both teams. Oregon St struck first with a run in the top of the 2nd. Arizona struck back with a run in the bottom half of the inning. It was 1-1 for a while until Arizona put up two runs late in the game during the bottom half of the 6th and this was enough to send the Oregon St Beavers home.  The next game was Texas vs Oklahoma, The Sooners took an early 2-1 lead at the end of the first inning and the Longhorns were never able to regain the lead and ended up losing to the Sooners 7-2. The next game was Florida vs Oklahoma St. Florida had previously beaten many ranked and unranked teams to get to this point but they were still coming in as underdog against a number 7 seeded Cowgirls ball club. The Cowgirls absolutely shut down the Gators offense only allowing 3 hits and being no-hit by the 2022 Big 12 Pitcher of the Year, Kelly Maxxwell. Maxwell threw all 7 innings and threw 9 strikeouts. Oklahoma St defeated Florida 2-0. Next game is Florida vs UCLA. Florida was upset after being no-hit by the Cowgirls then having to face another dominant UCLA pitcher by the name of Holly Azevado. Holly Azevado is not as good as Megan Faraimo but still a dominant pitcher having a 19-3 record going into this game This was another win or home game. UCLA took a 1-0 lead and the Gators could never answer back. The Gators offense remained cold, only producing 2 hits the whole game. Holly Azevado had the Gators looking silly at the plate throwing all 6 innings with only 2 strikeouts and no walks. UCLA produced 3 runs in the 4th inning and 4 runs in the 6th inning. The game concluded with an 8-0 Bruins victory and this ended Florida's season. 

The next game was UCLA vs Oklahoma. UCLA needed to beat Oklahoma twice in order to advance to the finals because UCLA was in the losers bracket. UCLA took an early 2-1 in the first inning against the Sooners. Oklahoma was unable to respond and get the lead back. UCLA scored 3 runs in the third inning increasing the lead to 5-1. Oklahoma struck back with 2 runs in the 4th making it a 5-3 game. UCLA added 2 runs in the 7th inning to increase the lead to 5 runs. UCLA beat Oklahoma 7-3 in the first game and handed the Sooners their first loss of the tournament and the 2nd loss of their whole season. This would make a second game take place. In the second game Oklahoma took an early 3-0 lead at the end of the first inning. UCLA couldn’t answer back. Oklahoma had their ace pitcher on the mound, Hope Tratuwein. Hope Trautwein is an All American pitcher who had 28 wins on the season before starting this game. When Trautwein took the mound to start game two, she was in complete control from the first pitch. Her approach was suffocating, shutting down the Bruins from the beginning. The senior finished with six strikeouts, allowing just two hits in five innings, powering Oklahoma to a dominating 15-0 win. It was one of her best outings of the season. Oklahoma’s offense was powered by none other than senior All American utility player Jocelyn Alo who had 4 hits 2 of which were home runs and 7 RBIs. UCLA was sadly destroyed by the number one seeded Sooners and their season was over. 

The next game was Cowgirls vs the Longhorns and the winner would go onto face the unstoppable Sooners. Texas stunned the Cowgirls in a 5-0 shutout in the first game. No one expected a shutone from the underdog unranked Texas Longhorns. But they were able to minimize Oklahoma State’s offense to only 4 hits and got the bats going early with a 3-o lead at the end of the second inning. This would force a game two and the winner of this game would meet Oklahoma in the finals. Game 2 was an incredible game, possibly the best game of the 2022 NCAA Division 1 softball tournament. The Cowgirls took an early 5-0 lead. Scoring one run in the first inning, a 2 run homerun in the 2nd inning, and another 2 run homerun in the 3rd. Kelly Maxxwell the Cowgirls best pitcher and also the 2022 Big 12 Pitcher of the Year had 5 strikeouts in the first 3 innings. Then in the top of the 4th the Texas offense rose awake. Putting on a rally against Kelly Maxxwell, with a huge 3 run home run. Narrowing the Cowgirls lead to 2. It was a 5-3 game going into the top of the 5th inning. And starting another rally against Kelly Maxxwell. One hit scored 3 runs for Texas and this put them in the lead it was 6-5. On this play the right fielder bobbled the ball allowing the first runner to score, then she threw it in the to cut off person and the cut off person tried to throw it to second base to get the runner out at 2nd but accidentally make an atrocious error and threw the ball into center field thus allowing the other runner and the batter to score. The rest of the game there was very restricted offense and it ended up with Texas defeating the Cowgirls 6 to 5. Kelly Maxxwell pitched an amazing game throwing 6 and ⅔ innings allowing 4 hits while facing 29 batters allowing 3 earned runs and 5 walks. 

Finally we have the championship matchup: the unranked Texas Longhorns vs the number one seed Oklahoma Sooners looking for its 2nd straight title. May I remind you that Texas previously beat Oklahoma in the regular season then Oklahoma beat Texas earlier in the playoffs. Do you think Texas was prepared and ready to take on the unstoppable Sooners? Just a quick reminder unranked Texas had already knocked out 3 top 25 opponents in this tournament. They beat the number 14 seed University of Washington in the regional round, then they beat number 4 Arkansas in the super regionals, then they beat out the number 7 Oklahoma St Cowgirls in the semifinals. Game one was on June 8th and Texas started off the scoring in the top of the 1st with a 1-0 lead. Then Jocelyn Alo changed things in the bottom of the first, slamming a screwball into the left-field stands to give the Sooners a lead. The Sooners would continue to pound the Longhorns pitching staff in the first inning scoring 6 runs. It would only get worse for Texas as the Sooners hit a WCWS-record six home runs to tear the game open. Texas was unable to get the bats going the rest of the game only having 2 hits the rest of the game. The Oklahoma All American Pitcher Hope Trautwein has shut down the Longhorns’ leadoff hitter, keeping her off base in her first three at-bats. Oklahoma ended up winning game one 16 to 1. Texas was furious with this humiliating loss and would come back for game 2. Game 2 was Thursday June 9th. Texas started off the scoring in the first inning scoring 2 runs off Oklahoma’s All American freshman pitcher Jordy Bahl. Texas pitching was able to handle the Sooners offense for the first 3 innings of the game. Then in the forth inning a leadoff double for the Sooners would start a rally. And the  Longhorns  would lose there lead and it would be 2-2 going into the 5th inning. In the top of the 5th the Sooners had a nice two out rally started by a single that lead to a double then a 3 run blast giving the Sooners a 6-2 lead. Texas offense was quiet in the bottom of the fifth. And the Sooners offense would continue to overpower the Longhorns pitching in the 6th inning scoring another 4 runs. It was 10-2 Sooners headed into the 7th. Texas tried to come back in the 7th inning but it was a little too late. They did hit a 3 run homerun but is was not enough as the Sooners would win 10 to 5. Although the Sooners did not obtain a perfect season they were able to achieve back to back WCWS titles.