For the first time since 2015, the Kansas softball team is back in the NCAA Tournament.
The Jayhawks are a No. 8 seed in the tournament as a whole, as well as the second-ranked team in the regional hosted by their former conference foe, No. 1 seed Oklahoma. KU (35-19) will open its run in the four-team double-elimination tournament by taking on Michigan (34-20) at Love’s Field in Norman, Oklahoma, at 5 p.m. on Friday.
OU (48-8) will battle America East tournament champion Binghamton (20-25) at 2:30 p.m. on Friday, and the winners and losers of each matchup will face off the following day.
The tournament field was announced on Sunday. KU played its way not only off the bubble but into a seeded position in the top half of the field with late-season victories over Wichita State, Oklahoma State and UCF to improve its positioning.
It’s been a long road back to the postseason for the Jayhawks, who last qualified in 2015. Head coach Jennifer McFalls, who took over in the summer of 2018 and has said it took longer than she expected to reach this point, credited this season’s success to both a “committed and loyal” group of juniors and seniors and underclassmen who are laying the foundation for the program’s future.
“It’s emotional,” McFalls said of the selection. “It’s obviously so exciting. I don’t know, my heart just bleeds so much for this senior class and all the players that have poured in all the work over the last couple years.”
KU was close to qualifying in 2024 before experiencing a catastrophic late-season slide and then struggled for much of 2025. But McFalls has added new assistant coaches in recent years and then this year saw both dramatic improvement at the plate from returning players and immediate contributions from freshmen like catcher Ella Boyer, the Big 12 freshman of the year, and pitchers Blakely Barber and Lila Partridge.
“I think this work requires a balance of patience when there are indicators that the trend lines and the trajectory and the commitment and things are good,” KU athletic director Travis Goff told the Journal-World in a recent interview, “but then it also requires all of us to challenge ourselves around what are some things that we need to do to adapt. And I give Jen a lot of credit and the staff a lot of credit for doing both those things. Don’t completely run astray from your own philosophies and approach, but sharpen, tweak, adapt as needed.”
McFalls said she was telling Goff and her sport administrator Nicole Corcoran as early as the fall that this year’s team could be special.
“And so obviously it’s paid off, and it’s been really exciting to see that,” she said. “I think more than anything, this team just needed some confidence, and to be able to look in the mirror and realize they were really good.”
Senior second baseman Campbell Bagshaw credited the success to “our chemistry and our drive.”
“This team is very gritty,” Boyer said. “We always work hard, we always have energy, and I think that’s one of the things that pushes us over the edge. Our goal going into this year was we were going to make the postseason, and we worked really hard to get here. And I think it’s just so great to see our work come to life, but also, it’s not done yet.”
KU took its lumps early in the season. That included a 4-2 loss to Michigan during its 2-3 opening weekend in Fort Myers, Florida, a game in which the Jayhawks led 2-1 in the sixth inning before giving up a leadoff home run to Lauren Putz and RBI singles to Erin Hoehn and Avery Fantucci.
“I mean, it’s kind of redemption, right?” Bagshaw said. “We played them and we didn’t get the result that we wanted, so we can hopefully get some revenge on them.”
KU rounded into form in time for league play, picking up some impressive wins at a tournament in Arkansas and then dominating Wichita State and Utah State before beginning its Big 12 slate.
At that point, the Jayhawks simply refused to lose series. They won the rubber matches of five straight Big 12 series, often in dramatic fashion — consider the clutch pitching late from Partridge and Kaelee Washington against Arizona State or September Flanagan’s walk-off winner against Baylor — and managed to avoid sweeps against UCF and Oklahoma State.
KU then rallied from down four runs to beat the Knights in the Big 12 tournament before getting run-ruled by Texas Tech in a semifinal matchup.
One thing the Jayhawks did not do along the way was play against Oklahoma, a team they had faced every season (excluding pandemic-shortened 2020) since 1979. The Sooners left the Big 12 after the 2024 season, but hosted KU in a nonconference tournament last year.
Now there’s a chance KU and OU may meet and continue their nearly 50-year streak: “It’s familiar territory for sure,” said McFalls, a former Texas assistant.
“It’s an amazing atmosphere,” Bagshaw said. “I mean, they have an awesome field, great facility, and then just the fans. It’s really cool, in my opinion, to just play in front of a crowd that’s so invested in the sport of softball, and it’s just continuing to grow. No matter who they’re cheering for, if you’re able to kind of channel that into being your supporters, it works out for you.”
Should the teams find themselves matched up at some point during the weekend, historical trends would be on the Sooners’ side. While OU has looked at least somewhat more vulnerable than usual in 2026 at 48-8, the program has beaten KU 25 consecutive times, 13 by run rule. This year’s team is led by SEC Freshman of the Year Kendall Wells, who ranks second in the nation with 36 home runs and fifth with 79 RBIs.
Binghamton, for its part, swept the America East’s softball honors with the player of year in sophomore catcher Elisa Allen, pitcher of the year in junior Brianna Roberts, rookie of the year in designated player/catcher Rachel Carey and coach of the year in Jess Bump.
As for Michigan, the only team KU is guaranteed to face, the outfielder Putz was one of the Big Ten’s most menacing hitters with a .442 batting average and 1.541 OPS, as she hit 21 home runs and tallied 77 RBIs. Hoehn was a two-way standout who had a 4.29 ERA with 95 strikeouts in the circle and a .358 average at the plate.
“We had the lead in the game (against Michigan) and probably should have won that game early on,” McFalls said. “So it’s exciting, I think it’s a great matchup for us to start off. And again, I just told them today, anything could happen. You know, we’ve got to be able to go in there and have a lot of faith and confidence in what we’re doing. It’s a whole lot more pressure on OU than it is on Kansas right now going into this tournament.”
OU is, of course, a powerhouse that won four straight titles from 2021 to 2024 and has made the Women’s College World Series on nine straight occasions. If KU improbably breaks that streak, it will advance out of a regional for the first time since 1992.
