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Happy New Year! I'm looking forward to the second year of my college softball blog. If you're a regular from last year, welcome back, and if you've come across this page for the first time, glad to have you.

In looking over the team pages for the nation's top collegiate softball programs (see links along the right-hand side), Friday, February 9 appears to be the opening day of the 2007 season for many schools. Non-conference play in softball tends to center around tournaments in warm-weather climates. As they get closer, I will preview these tournaments.

Shortly after last season ended, I listed the outgoing seniors for what I considered the nation's top programs (click here for the June 2006 archive, then scroll down to June 13). Based on returning talent, I'm looking for Arizona, Northwestern, and Tennessee (not necessarily in that order) to be the teams to beat in '07.

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This Friday (and all remaining Fridays of the regular season), I will preview the upcoming weekend's games. Before doing so, I wanted to do an entry, primarily for sports fans who have not watched much softball, on differences they could expect to see between softball and baseball. The Sandy Plains Softball Association of Marietta, Georgia has produced a document entitled Fastpitch 101 , which details the similarities and differences in the rules of the two sports. Here are some of my own observations from over the years: 1. Because the bases are considerably closer together in softball (60 feet) than in baseball (90 feet), softball infielders consistently must pick up ground balls and make their throws to first base quickly, in order to get the runner. In other words, many (if not most) softball grounders result in "bang-bang" plays at first base, necessitating a lot of close calls by first-base umpires, who must detect whether the thrown ball (to the first-baseperso...
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