The first weekend of the WCWS (Women’s College World Series) had some great games. The best teams found a way to pull out the wins when it mattered to advance to Super Regionals. Below is a collection of my favorite quotes from each coach headed to the next round!
Oklahoma
Head Coach: Patty Gasso
[Paraphrased]: The power of three. This is the story in 2 Samuel 23 of three mighty men. The first man was a great leader but wants the whole army to lead with him. You don’t have to leave it to one person, everyone is in this together. The second mighty man says, “I got your back” because back in the day the armor was in the front and the back was open so they would fight back-to-back. The third mighty man says, “I’ll fight when no one else will fight.” When everyone else is tired I will not quit or stop. Everyone on the team must be like this.
Washington
Head Coach: Heather Tarr
“I think there’s a fine line as a coach between being patient but also being aggressive. It’s kind of like being a good hitter. You have to know when to go for it. You have to know when to stop. As a coach that’s a skill you learn along the way—to be able to find ways to reach each player and to be where you need to be when you need to be there.”
Oklahoma will face off against Washington 5/28 at 12:00PM on ESPN 2
**ALL TIMES POSTED ARE PACIFIC TIME**
JMU
Head Coach: Loren LaPorte
“We talk to the girls all the time about being able to handle change and adversity. How you handle this is going to be based on what happens next… [COVID] was something our team and us as a staff had never experienced, but we had to go with it. It’s kind of like the game sometimes. It throws us curveballs that we never know what’s going to happen but it’s how we stay together.”
Missouri
Head Coach: Larissa Anderson
“These players will learn more life lessons from this year than any championship could ever teach them. Culture trumps everything.”
JMU will face Missouri 5/28 at 6:00 PM on ESPNU
Oklahoma State
Head Coach: Kenny Gajewski
“I know if we do everything we should and we help these kids—the winning is just a byproduct of that. We don’t talk about setting goals to win a national title… I know that’s going to happen for us. I don’t know when, but it’s gonna happen because we have good people, we have the right leadership to back me up… and why wouldn’t you want to have that?”
Texas
Head Coach: Mike White
You gotta have a great attitude to be out there. You gotta love the game. It’s gotta be where you get away from what’s happening. And then you gotta have great effort. You gotta work harder than everybody else if you wanna succeed. People see what happens on the field, but they don’t see the hard work that goes in behind the scenes. The last part is respect… everywhere we go I want people to say Texas was as great off the field as they were on the field.”
Oklahoma State will face Texas 5/28 at 2:00PM on ESPN 2
Georgia
Head Coach: Lu Harris-Champer
“When you can do the fundamentals, you can have success. Just in the sense that that mindset was really, really great on teaching me a positive mindset — he (dad) would have me pitch with my eyes closed so that I could hit a location with my eyes closed. It was pretty awesome stuff; you know the power of the mind. Another thing my dad taught me was that you’re going to get what you think you are going to get. Also, he taught me work habits. If you’re willing to work for what you want, then you will have a pretty good opportunity to be successful.”
Florida
Head Coach: Tim Walton
“It’s important to have bricks [to build a wall] but the only way our wall is going to stand is if we put in the mortar—we put in all the time in between [the bricks]. If we all go down, we’re going down together… everybody impacted our program…the foundation would be what it is but if it doesn’t have the relationships and the bond, it’s not going to stay together.”
Florida will face Georgia 5/28 at 2:00 on ESPNU
Alabama
Head Coach: Patrick Murphy
“Grit is the number one factor in predicting success later in life. Not IQ, not a bunch of other things. It’s the ability to bounce back after failure. That’s what softball does to a kid. Softball, baseball, any sport where you lose, are you gonna bounce back or are you gonna pout for a month or two?”
Kentucky
Head Coach: Rachel Lawson
“When you’re in the beginning of the season and into the middle you’re very stats-based, you’re very number-oriented… everything is charted and it’s just pressure, pressure, pressure the whole time. As you get closer to the post-season it’s all about just win and move on.”
Alabama will face Kentucky 5/28 at 10:00 AM on ESPN2
Arizona
Head Coach: Mike Candrea
“The other thing I’ve found with coaching the female athlete is being able to embrace holding other people accountable in our culture. I think it’s so important in a team concept that you’re not scared to hold each other accountable and look at it in a positive way instead of a negative way…. We care about you enough to hold you accountable because that’s gonna bring us success down the road.”
Arkansas
Head Coach: Courtney Deifel
“[To play on our team] they have to have a level of talent that’s going to be successful in our conference… but beyond that, we look at the person. We’re never going to sacrifice talent alone for not the right character fit for us. So when you come to watch us play, it’s gonna be pretty evident that we recruit that gritty, competitive, selfless, teammate that is going to fit in our system.”
Arizona will face Arkansas at 4:00 PM on ESPNU
LSU
Head Coach: Beth Torina
“I don’t know if the best team wins this year. I think that the team that deals with all the challenges and adversity that we’re presented with this season… is going to be the team that succeeds. I think that it’s gonna be one of the… most well-deserved national championships…. I think the battle to succeed in these conditions is gonna say a lot more about your program than just if you’re good at softball.”
Florida State
Head Coach: Lonnie Alameda
“Dani Morgan talked about that last night. She was like, I just want to have fun every single time I go out on the field, and I want to make sure the freshmen go out there and have fun every single day. We love softball, we want to win, but the byproduct of winning is we love what we do, and we want to have fun. I wanna win a national championship, I want to send those seniors out with another one under their belt, but if you don’t get after it every single day and have fun at what you’re doing, it is really hard to get there.”
LSU will face Florida State 5/27 at 4:00 on ESPN
Virginia Tech
Head Coach: Pete D’Amour
“Some of these freshmen—it was the biggest game they have ever played in their life. You can say you played in the state championship, and you can say PGF championships and all this but there was a million people watching you. It was natural to feel nervous. Once I said that I think there was just a weight that lifted off the kids and the crowds didn’t really matter after that and we just went out and played!”
UCLA
Head Coach: Kelly Inouye-Perez
“It’s not what happens, but what you do next that is your defining moment.”
