As you read this column today, Thursday, there are nearly 200 athletes, hundreds of friends and family members of those athletes, and thousands of fans gathered in Oklahoma City for the Women’s College World Series.
It is truly a spectacular event, featuring eight of the best women’s NCAA Division I college softball teams pitted together in a tournament that will last a little more than a week.
It’s exciting that the Hall of Fame Stadium will be filled, that every game will be televised, and that some of the best athletes who many have never heard of will get their just due.
But it hasn’t always been that way.
Since I covered my first women’s college event in the fall of 1976 — which I know for sure was a University of Southern Mississippi women’s basketball game that may or may not have been against Spring Hill — things have changed for women’s athletics for the better. Much better.
Is there more room to grow? For sure there is. But it seems the powers that be are finally understanding the importance of supporting and encouraging female athletes of all ages.
I truly appreciate female athletes. In fact, I’m married to one and the grandfather of another.
My wife Barbara played college basketball at the Mississippi University for Women and tells me stories about people having to sit in folding chairs along the wall to watch some of her games. Now, those athletes play in huge arenas in front of thousands of fans.
My granddaughter Harper, who plays travel softball and soccer on the club level, wears the nicest uniforms, gets great coaching, and plays at amazing venues. And she’s just 9-years-old.
This week Barb, Harper, my 6-year-old grandson Easton, and myself are in Oklahoma City to watch a couple days of the WCWS.
In 2013, my brother-and-law David and myself decided, on a whim, that we wanted to go see the Women’s College World Series “just once.” So we bought season tickets and made our way to OKC and immediately fell in love with the atmosphere, the athletes, the stadium, the style-of-play … all of it.
So we kept our season tickets and went back the next six years. We even began splitting up the week. He and I would go to a couple games, then David and his wife Gwen would go to the finals, or my wife Barb would join me for the championship series. Gwen and David got to take their granddaughter Alyssa once and then in 2019, the year before COVID, Barb and I were able to take Harper, who was then just 6, with us to the final series between Oklahoma and UCLA.
Let me just be honest with you — OKC and the WCWS is always fun and entertaining, but it’s absolutely “lights out” when Oklahoma is playing. Although the Sooners lost the series in two straight games to what Barb, Harper, and I call the “Stinky Bears” of UCLA, Harper was in love with Oklahoma softball.
In 2020, COVID-19 robbed us of the WCWS, and last season David and I opted out because there was talk of spreading the fans out and there was no guarantee we would have our seats. And we love our seats located on the top row of Section 3 halfway down the left field line between third base and the fence.
But this year, I am returning to the World Series with Barb, Harper, and Easton in tow.
Harper is excited that Oklahoma will be playing on Thursday and made sure the red Oklahoma Sooners shirt she got three years ago was packed for the trip.
When she was 6, she was just beginning softball and wasn’t sure how she liked the sport. But a bunch of student athletes who did not know her name or where she was from, reached up and touched her hands and those off all the other little girls that were hanging over the wall as they walked onto the field for the games at that WCWS. As a result she became more interested in softball and how the game was played. Those players happened to be wearing Oklahoma red. And now Harper does as well.
Today, weather permitting, she and I will sit through all or parts of four games, cheering, watching good softball, eating a lot of food, and likely getting hot, wet, and cold — after all, it is Oklahoma City in June.
Just like I did with her father when he was 9 and we were watching baseball together, I will point out to her what the players are doing and why they are doing it, teaching her the nuances of the game and just enjoying her company and fanning the flame of her love of softball.
I will show her the big stadium and we will talk about the nice uniforms the players have and all of the television cameras and all of the exposure the game has now … and we will also talk about how far things have come.
But, we will also talk about how far it can grow.
On Friday night, Barb and Easton will be able to join us as all four of us can soak up the atmosphere of a special, special place.
And maybe, just maybe, we can all go back again next year and make some more memories.
But for now … play ball!!!!
Austin Bishop, AKA The Old Sports Dude, has been covering high school, college, amateur, and professional sports since 1975.
He is currently pastor of Great Commission Assembly of God in Philadelphia, Miss. He may be contacted by email at starsportsboss@yahoo.com or by phone at 601-938-2471.
