USA Softball today announced the country's national ( press release , roster ) and university-level ( press release , roster ) teams for upcoming international competitions. On the roster pages, you can click on each player's name to get a profile of her (this feature does not appear to be available for the university team yet). The USA national team will participate in both the World Cup of softball, a six-team gathering July 13-17 in Oklahoma City and the World Championships , a 16-team competition August 27-September 5 in Beijing, China. Although the above-linked release for the university team says the squad will play in the 2006 World University Games, I'm pretty sure that's in error. The World University Games are played in odd-numbered years , plus this timetable says (correctly, I believe) the team will be playing in the July 15-23 World University Softball Championships in Taiwan. The national team's roster consists of 17 players. Eleven of them were...

Welcome to my end-of-season round-up of where things stand for 14 top college softball programs (the eight WCWS participants, plus six other teams that I would consider “high-level”). Below, I list each team's outgoing seniors (noting in bold which ones finished in the top 10 in any major NCAA statistical categories) and provide any news developments I'm aware of, related to a given team. A link to the NCAA statistical leaders is available here . Of all the statistics, I’m most skeptical of pitcher wins, because offensive support is obviously also a major factor there. Here we go! Arizona Seniors: Autumn Champion, Leslie Wolfe, Kelly Nelson, Alicia Hollowell (ERA 8th, K/7 INN 5th , Wins 5th) Here's a report on the Wildcats’ victory celebration back at U of A. Taryne Mowatt, who just finished her sophomore season with a strong offensive performance in the WCWS, ranked 9th in strikeouts per 7 innings in her pitching stints. Northwestern Seniors: Courtnay Foster, Sheila ...

Just a brief posting, as I continue to work on my big end-of-season round-up of where the top college softball programs stand, with the loss of their seniors from this past go-round. An announcement has been made that the "II World Cup" of softball (that's how it's listed, with the Roman numeral first) will take place July 13-17 in Oklahoma City. Six countries will participate: Australia, China, Canada, Great Britain, Japan (last year's inaugural winner) and the USA. This USA Softball timetable says that the "National Team Selection Camp" will start tomorrow, running June 12-16.

Well, another college softball season is on the books. I first want to thank everyone who has visited my blog during its inaugural season, and sent me e-mails. A blog is of no use if nobody goes to it! Second, I want to invite everyone to keep visiting the site over the summer. I've done write-ups nearly every day for the past few weeks -- and often multiple entries per day -- so I am going to relax for a while and slow down a bit in my postings. However, there are several topics I'd like to write about over the summer, so the entries will not come to a complete stop. Plus, even when I'm not doing much writing, I believe this site will always serve as an excellent portal to other softball sites, via the links section in the right-hand portion of the page. The next thing I plan to write -- probably within the next two weeks or so -- is a status round-up of the top softball programs (key seniors from this past season whose shoes will have to be filled, stadium upgrades,...

9:20 pm Central: It's now over! Alicia Hollowell strikes out the last Northwestern batter looking on a 3-2 pitch with the bases loaded, and Arizona wins the national championship, 5-0. In three games against Hollowell (two in the championship round and an early-season nonconference game), Northwestern never got a run off of her. Northwestern did get 9 hits tonight -- enough to threaten to score a few times while the game was still close -- but never got it done. Congratulations to the Wildcats -- the Arizona Wildcats for winning the national championship and the Northwestern Wildcats, runner-up in their first trip to the World Series in 20 years. 9:15 pm Central: Northwestern isn't going down without a fight. Trailing 5-0 with two out in the top of the seventh, NU has put together two singles -- make that three. It's still a huge long shot for Northwestern, of course, but U of A hasn't yet closed the deal... 9:05 pm Central: Arizona continues to str...

9:35 pm Central: Nothing happened since my last entry to change the dynamics of WCWS championship series Game 1. In fact, things even deteriorated a bit more for Northwestern, as it lost 8-0 (the same score by which U of A spanked NU earlier in the season, as the ESPN2 announcers pointed out). Arizona's Alicia Hollowell threw a no-hitter in that earlier game, and almost did so again tonight. Northwestern did get a hit this time, but only one. A single by Jamie Dotson leading off the bottom of the fifth broke up Hollowell's bid for a repeat no-hitter over NU. Combining the earlier no-hitter with tonight's game, Hollowell ended up pitching 10 straight hitless innings against the Purple* (not 11, as I had written earlier, as the previous game ended after six innings due to the "run rule" or "mercy rule"). *Since Arizona and Northwestern are both the Wildcats, I'm having to come up with alternative designations for the teams! 8:15 pm C...

8:00 pm Central: In what for the last few innings was just a formality, Arizona has defeated Tennessee to claim the second spot in the championship series. It all now comes down to the Wildcats (Northwestern) vs. Wildcats (Arizona), two-out-of-three starting Monday night, for the national championship. See you tomorrow... 7:40 pm Central: 6-0 Arizona, midway through the sixth. 6:55 pm Central: Another inning, another run, 5-0 Arizona. I wonder if the "run rule" (an eight-run lead after at least five innings) applies in the WCWS? 6:35 pm Central: It's now 4-0 Arizona in the second. This game could be getting out of hand soon, if it's not already! 6:25 pm Central: Arizona has taken a 2-0 lead over Tennessee in the top of the first inning of their winner-take-all game to qualify for the championship series. The Wildcats were helped in good part by shoddy Vol infield play (an apparent carryover from the ending of the two teams' first contest earlier today...

11:15 pm Central: A few final thoughts for the evening... As has been the case in past years' WCWS tournaments, Texas's downfall was lack of offense this year, too. Despite dramatic improvement offensively during the regular-season by the Longhorns, in the two losses that eliminated them from the World Series this year (against Arizona and UCLA), Texas scored no runs. After the last Texas batter was retired, pitcher Cat Osterman showed the sadness of having her collegiate career end without a national championship. As UCLA sports fans will probably never forget, after the Bruin men's basketball team pulled off a stunning comeback against Gonzaga this past March in the NCAA regionals, the Zags' Adam Morrison exhibited probably as much visible despondency as anyone in recent memory. As summarized in this ESPN.com article , UCLA's Arron Afflalo then made what I thought were some very gracious remarks regarding Morrison: "I felt for him," Afflalo said. ...

10:55 pm Central: Northwestern got by Tennessee, 2-0 , a little while ago. What this means is that Northwestern and Arizona are each one victory away from making it to the championship series, a 2-out-of-3 affair that would start Monday night. If Northwestern and Arizona indeed were to meet in the championship round -- and it's still very premature to say so -- it would be the Wildcats vs. the Wildcats! Let's take a look at the brackets , now that losers' bracket play will begin tomorrow... First, let's look at the top half of the draw (the part that started out with Arizona, Oregon State, Arizona State, and Texas). In the losers' bracket of this section, Oregon State and Arizona State meet tomorrow at 11:00 am Central, the loser going home. In determining the next opponent for the winner of this game, a little "switcheroo" comes along. Of the two teams that suffered their first losses tonight -- Texas and Tennessee -- Texas would seem to be the log...

11:21 pm Central: The first pitch of the UCLA-Tennessee game is delivered. The Bruins' Anjelica (Jelly) Selden throws a strike to the Vols' Sarah Fekete . 10:55 pm Central: It's over! Northwestern wins 6-5 in the bottom of the 10th. 10:35 pm Central: It's a long day of softball! Alabama is batting against Northwestern in the top of the 10th inning, with the score tied 5-5. And there's still another game to go (UCLA-Tennessee)! One minute it looks like Northwestern is going to win, then like Alabama is going to win, then Northwestern,... The Crimson Tide was one strike away from winning in the bottom of the seventh, and its pitcher, Chrissy Owens (who had earlier replaced Stephanie VanBrakle ) had not given up a home run all year. The Wildcats seemed to be in dire straits, but really they were in Dyer straits, Erin Dyer , that is. Sure enough, Dyer hit one over the center-field fence to tie the game. 6:45 pm Central: Texas has just finished off A...