Ready or not, college softball season is upon us. If you're not quite ready to spend your weekends at the diamond, or even if you are, consider this a cheat sheet. The aim each week is to bring you five stories that defined the week or help navigate the long road to Oklahoma City and the Women's College World Series.
1. Florida looks the part of favorite
The first game of No. 1 Florida's softball doubleheader Sunday commenced while women's basketball power Connecticut was rolling to a nationally televised win. Watching the Huskies coast with one eye while keeping the other eye on live stats of Florida putting up shutout inning after shutout inning against Virginia Tech, it was apparent that there are more similarities between the way the two champions went about their business than the rest of softball should be comfortable with.
To put it another way, it sure looks like this dominance is becoming a habit in Gainesville.
By the time Florida finally gave up its first run of the season, in the third inning of its fourth game, it had already scored 33 unanswered runs to open defense of the second of back-to-back titles. The Gators became the first defending champion since Arizona in 1992 to shut out their first three opponents, and did so without repeating a starting pitcher.
Did we mention that one of the wins was an 8-0 run-rule win against No. 2 Michigan in a rematch of last season's championship series? Or that for the second season in a row, Florida beat Michigan during the opening weekend with a freshman pitcher making her first college start?
Like Aleshia Ocasio a year ago, freshman Kelly Barnhill, she of Team USA, didn't blink. Apparently neither did classmate Amanda Lorenz, who batted third all weekend and hit .500 with five walks and five RBIs.
2. Auburn comes out hitting
No. 3 Auburn scored 87 runs in winning its first five games this season. That is as many runs as four Division I teams scored during the entire 2015 season.
Oklahoma led the nation in runs per game a season ago, ranked five spots ahead of Auburn. The best Lauren Chamberlain, Shelby Pendley and the Sooners managed in any five-game stretch, split across two weeks, was 82 runs. Auburn surpassed that in its first five games.
No one will accuse Auburn of jumping in the scheduling deep end. The tournament it hosted during the opening weekend wasn't Florida beating Michigan or Kentucky beating Oregon, to pick two of Auburn's SEC peers that challenged themselves and were rewarded for it. But Appalachian State, Butler, Furman and Western Kentucky are not the dregs of college softball, merely out of their depth trying to stop a lineup intent on hitting its way back to Oklahoma City.
Most notable for the Tigers was Whitney Jordan, who totaled just three hits as a freshman reserve a season ago. The starter at shortstop in all five games in place of injured Haley Fagan, Jordan finished the weekend with five hits, including two home runs, a double and a triple. She also walked three times and drove in 11 runs.
It gets more difficult immediately, assuming No. 17 UCF hands the ball to ace Shelby Turnier when Auburn visits for a game Wednesday. Turnier already shut down Alabama this season.
3. Washington makes its case
Everyone knew Florida and Auburn would be good. Since Washington began the season ranked No. 20 in both major polls, might we have missed the boat on the Huskies? Work remains with a game Monday at UNLV, but few teams made better use of the weekend than the Huskies in beating two ranked teams, No. 9 Oklahoma and No. 15 Minnesota, and outscoring four opponents by a combined 45-13 margin.
Even without Kylee Lahners, who is now swinging her bat in National Pro Fastpitch, the lineup came through from top to bottom. That included familiar run producers like Ali Aguilar, Courtney Gano and Casey Stangel but also the likes of sophomore Julia DePonte, who drove in nine runs and nearly matched her entire freshman season with five extra-base hits.
But if the statistics weren't as gaudy, it's the pitching that catches the eye when it comes to the team's potential. Freshman Taran Alvelo went the distance against Oklahoma and Minnesota, even getting the better of Sara Groenewegen in Sunday's finale. And Stanford transfer Madi Schreyer, despite giving up a couple of big hits, struck out nine batters in eight-plus innings. It's still a wait-and-see situation in the circle, but there may be reason to think it will be worth a wait.
4. Tale of two Kelseys
Oregon's Cheridan Hawkins is the only active pitcher with more career wins than Kentucky senior Kelsey Nunley, but the gap closed in a way that rather perfectly sums up how Nunley has changed the identity of a softball program in Lexington.
Oregon eventually got to Nunley for three home runs when the teams met Saturday in Arizona. But it was Kentucky's ace who helped ensure the Wildcats had a cushion to hold on for an 8-6 upset win. Nunley, who had just four hits in limited at-bats in her first season, hit her first career home run when she led off the third inning against Hawkins in what was then a scoreless game. She doesn't always win games on her own, either in the circle or at the plate, and she got help Saturday from freshman Abbey Cheek's grand slam. But it isn't even remotely a coincidence that Kentucky won a lot of big games in her time there.
Nunley wasn't the only Kelsey with World Series experience to stand out. Oklahoma's Kelsey Stevens took the loss against Washington, but she also earned two wins. One was a three-hit shutout against Syracuse in which she didn't walk or hit a batter and threw 66 of 86 pitches for strikes. Because it squeezed between Keilani Ricketts and Paige Parker chronologically, the season Stevens put together when Oklahoma reached the World Series in 2014 stands some risk of being overshadowed. A 51-start feat of endurance, it determined the course of that season for the Sooners. But Stevens then struggled with control in limited innings a season ago. In fact, the Syracuse performance was her first start without a walk since 2014. It's a good story for a deserving person if she's back. But it's also a big deal for Oklahoma's wins and losses.
5. Mid-majors make their mark
Fresno State: Its championship pedigree and history aside, Fresno State fits this category, but it may sit comfortably near the top of it with Jill Compton. The senior ace was 3-0 with a 0.33 ERA and added a save to fuel the team's unbeaten start. Encouraging for the Bulldogs is that it was the combination of Taylor Langdon and Hannah Harris who pitched in a win against Tennessee.
UNC-Greensboro: A team that hadn't beaten an opponent from a major conference in nearly three years swept three games against that competition en route to a 4-1 opening weekend. UNCG beat Kansas twice and NC State once at a tournament in Jacksonville and put up 29 runs in those three wins, part of a 50-run effort on the weekend. Between them, Stephanie Bryden and twin sisters Lindsay and Nicole Thomas hit .630 with 25 RBIs and 19 runs scored.
North Dakota State: Like the FX series "Fargo," named after the city the university calls home, North Dakota State keeps putting out quality seasons. Somehow, despite losing all-time ace Krista Menke and going through preseason in, you know, Fargo, the Bison turned in an impressive 2-3 record against Arkansas, North Carolina and Texas, marred only by the seventh-inning lead they surrendered in the finale against the Longhorns. Many with more resources and better weather should feel guilty when they look at this program's ability to compete consistently.
Pacific: The biggest upset of the weekend went to Pacific, which not only beat No. 3 LSU but did so in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where the home team was 38-5 a season ago. The rematch Sunday didn't go so well for the visitors, but a lot of teams will take a split at Tiger Park.
Texas State: The only loss came against rival Northwestern State. But two wins against Oklahoma State and another against DePaul more than make up for the setback. Sophomore Randi Rupp is 4-1 with a 0.55 ERA out of the gates and could be right there with James Madison's dynamic duo in terms of the best mid-major aces.