Observations from Week Seven of the College Softball Season

BY Roger McAfee

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Photo courtesy Texas A&M Softball

Week seven of the college softball season provided plenty of excitement and highlights, including Texas A&M sweeping Auburn to mark the best start in SEC play in school history.

The Aggies quick start in SEC play has them sitting at the top of the league standings with an 8-1 record. Meanwhile, the Tennessee Lady Vols, the owners of the longest winning streak in the nation, sit in second place with a perfect 5-0 record. The Lady Vols will be after a sweep of South Carolina when the two finish off the three-game series tonight (March 25) on the SEC Network.

Florida and Georgia are both right behind the Aggies and the Lady Vols with 5-1 records in SEC play.

Top-ranked Oklahoma remained in first place in the Big 12 standings as the Sooners swept a three-game series from Baylor. The first game of the series was played at USA Softball Hall of Fame Stadium and drew 8,798 fans to watch the Sooners pull away late for the win. The series resumed in Norman and the Sooners completed the sweep with a doubleheader sweep on Saturday. Attendance for the three-game series was 17,469 which marked the highest-attended weekend series in program history.

The Sooners have plenty of company at the top of the Big 12 standings as Texas, Oklahoma State and Kansas are right behind OU. The Longhorns are second in the Big 12 with an 8-1 record after a three-game sweep of UCF, while the Cowgirls and the Jayhawks are 7-2 in conference play.

While Virginia Tech was splitting a weekend series against Alabama, the Hokies got some help in the standings from Louisville and Virginia. The Cardinals defeated Duke in game two of their series, while the Cavaliers won the series against Clemson by taking two of the three games.

The Hokies are currently 9-0 in the ACC, while Duke is 7-2 and Clemson is 6-3. Florida State is fourth in the ACC standings with a 4-2 mark.

Big Ten play got underway last weekend and Penn State made a statement right out of the gate. The Nittany Lions swept Indiana to open league play and stretched their win streak to eight games and improved to 23-6 on the season.

Defending Big Ten champion Northwestern also opened conference play with a 3-0 record as the Wildcats swept Michigan State.

Stanford remained undefeated, and in first place, in the Pac-12 Conference as the Cardinal swept Utah in a three-game series. The Cardinal improved to 6-0 in the Pac-12 with the sweep.

Oregon is currently in second place in the conference standings after defending The Jane with a three-game sweep of Arizona State. The Ducks improved to 7-2 with the sweep.

Washington improved to 6-3 in the Pac-12 by taking two of three games against UCLA. The series win for the Huskies was their first against UCLA since 2016.

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And New Home Run Champion at Southern Miss

Photo courtesy Southern Mississippi Softball

Graduate student catcher Hannah Borden launched a grand slam on the first pitch of her at-bat in the second inning, setting the all-time program record for most career home runs and making the difference in an 8-5 win versus Marshall Sunday at the Southern Miss Softball Complex. With the victory, Southern Miss (14-16, 3-3 Sun Belt) earned its first home conference series win in the Sun Belt and the first series win against Marshall since 2010. Having tied Megan Hill’s record of 41 home runs Saturday against the Thundering Herd, Borden moved atop the leaderboards with her tenth home run shot of the season and in dramatic fashion on a grand slam.

“It feels really good and it was really special knowing it was a home game and that it was a grand slam,” Borden said. “We really needed to win this series. We didn’t have the best turnout last weekend against ULM and this series was really important, so it felt good to get my team on top.”