OKLAHOMA CITY — Before the postseason began, few around the college softball world could agree on which team is the favorite to wind up as champion of the 2026 Women’s College World Series.
There were plenty of options. Alabama was the No. 1 team in the field. UCLA featured the greatest home run numbers on record. Nebraska had an all-world star, Jordy Frahm. Tennessee featured three dominant pitchers. The possibilities seemed endless.
Yet by the end of Monday’s four semifinal games, the national championship will be decided by the same teams who duked it out at Devon Park a year ago.
While there’s plenty of chatter between the Texas Tech and Texas fanbases on social media over the last few weeks, that energy has focused on hypotheticals on the football field. Meanwhile, the softball teams get to settle things on the field (again) and took similar paths to return to the finals.
“Obviously we have a few more players back from the same squad to build on, where Gerry (Glasco) had to kind of mesh and build and kind of create that way,” Texas head coach Mike White said. “But his strategy of using two pitchers has been a little bit different than ours. There’s different strategies within the squads with using personnel you have, but a similarity is that they’re both resilient teams.”
Each had to go a full three games in their respective Super Regional Series. Each suffered a loss in the first two days of the WCWS and needed to win twice in the semifinals to get back. The off-field drama surrounding the football programs pales in comparison to what the Red Raiders and Longhorns have endured to set up a second meeting for all the marbles.
“We’ve been able to fight back from adversity when needed,” White said. “Who comes back from eight runs down with two out? I’ve never seen that before. That alone says a lot about their squad and what they can do.
“We’ve just got to control what we can and worry about what we’re doing, but we also have a lot of respect for. … Texas Tech.”
Many of the marquee names from last year’s championship series — including pitchers NiJaree Canady of Texas Tech and Teagan Kavan of Texas — have returned for the rematch. There are a few new faces (many of them Red Raiders) who will play a role in the final outcome. Few of them, though, have any real knowledge of the rivalry between the two schools that long predates them, but they’re getting a crash course on it this week.
“It definitely runs deep,” Canady said. “… I’m not from Texas. I’m from Kansas originally, and then I spent two years at Stanford, obviously. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a rivalry this deep before. I don’t know, sports are different in Texas, so I’m just excited to be a part of it.”
The most recent addition to the stories of rivalry began with Texas football coach Steve Sarkisian being quoted as saying that a team in the state of Texas (presumably Texas Tech) plays in a conference (the Big 12) where the Longhorns could go undefeated by playing only their second- and third-string players.
Of course, the Red Raiders didn’t take to kindly to this. During last week’s Big 12 Conference meetings, Joey McGuire put out the invitations for Texas Tech and Texas to buy out their Week 1 opponents and find a way to play each other instead. That’s highly unlikely to happen, but has provided plenty of fodder for fans on both sides of the aisle.
That backdrop, though, has little to do with the championship series about to commence. That doesn’t mean the sides aren’t at least partially committed to the bit.
“I’m excited for the rivalry,” Lauren Allred said, “because there’s a lot going on with football right now in Texas and Texas Tech. So I think it’s just kind of adding fuel to the fire, and it’s fun to be a part of.”
Canady wants nothing more than to finish her career as a national champion. Having it come against Texas doesn’t make the possibility any sweeter.
“Honestly, not so much Texas, I feel like the best way to go out as a senior and just the senior class is to win a national championship in general, no matter who we’re playing,” Canady said. “So I feel like that’s always the goal.”
This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: Texas Tech softball, Texas amused by rivalry angle but not focused on it
Reporting by Nathan Giese, Lubbock Avalanche-Journal / Lubbock Avalanche-Journal
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
