Jordy Bahl put on a show in a dominant relief appearance to help the Oklahoma Sooners beat the Florida State Seminoles.
She took the softball world by storm as a true freshman in 2022. In a season with a bit of uncertainty in the circle, [autotag]Jordy Bahl[/autotag] became the ace of the staff until a shoulder injury limited her late in the season.
2023 has been a bit of a different story for the Sooners’ sophomore. She’s pitched well but hasn’t been the intensely dominant force that’s stalked the diamond like a lioness hunting her prey. But perhaps things are beginning to come together for the sophomore star.
Bahl pitched a perfect game on Friday against Southeastern Louisiana on Friday. She was hit around in Oklahoma’s Saturday matchup with Mississippi State before pitching a scoreless inning in relief against South Dakota State on Monday.
But it was a relief role on Tuesday evening that might have been her most impressive performance of the season.
[autotag]Alex Storako[/autotag] battled for four innings against a tough Florida State team, but allowed four earned runs. It was the first outing in which she’d allowed a run dating back more than a month when she allowed one earned run in 5.2 innings pitched to Stanford on February. 10. She’d gone 30.2 innings pitched without allowing a run.
After allowing a three-run home run in the top of the fourth, the Sooners’ offense responded, immediately taking the lead back. Then Jordy Bahl put on a show.
Bahl allowed a leadoff single to Josie Muffley, then proceeded to retire nine straight, including a stretch where she struck out six straight Seminoles.
In a challenging mid-week showdown of top 10 teams, this felt more like a postseason game between the Sooners and the Seminoles, teams that met in the 2021 Women’s College World Series.
But Jordy Bahl rose to the occasion against a lineup that was performing despite a raucous home environment favoring the Sooners. It was a clutch performance, reminding us why she’s considered one of the best pitchers in college softball.
It will be the ninth-ever game to be played in Ireland and the fifth at Aviva Stadium. Last season, the stadium hosted the Aer Lingus College Football Classic, a game that saw Northwestern defeat Nebraska 31-28 on August 27.
The first-ever game in Ireland was played in 1988 between Boston College and Army, a 38-24 win over the Eagles. Games were also played in 1989 between No.24 Pittsburgh and Rutgers as well as in 1997 between No. 19 Notre Dame and Navy before not coming back until 2012 when Notre Dame and Navy had a rematch at the first game at Aviva Stadium, a 50-10 win for the Fighting Irish.
Penn State and UCF would play as part of the Croke Park Classic in 2014, a 26-24 win for the Nittany Lions while in 2016 Georgia Tech defeated Boston College 17-14 in the first Aer Lingus College Football Classic.
This upcoming fall, Aviva Stadium will host Notre Dame and Navy for their third matchup in Ireland on August 26 as part of the Aer Lingus College Football Classic. While there have only been eight games over thirty years in Ireland, it often has been highly successful, drawing 38,000+ fans in seven of eight games including in each of the five games. While a large portion of those in attendance has been fans of the teams participating, many are also Irish nationals.
Penn State makes top schools cut for top-ranked player in Maryland in 2024
Penn State is known as “Linebacker U” for all the great linebackers that have come through the program.
They’re looking to keep that reputation going by continually getting elite talent on the recruiting trail.
2024 four-star linebacker, [autotag]Aaron Chiles[/autotag], recently cut his list down to 10 schools. On3’s 110th ranked player in the class has received offers from 39 programs across the country.
His top 10 list includes Penn State, Michigan, Maryland, LSU, Florida State, Georgia, Florida, Clemson, Ohio State and Notre Dame.
Chiles is a 6’3″ 220 pound linebacker from Maryland who is listed as the best player in the state.
He recently spoke with Hayes Fawcett of On3 and explained what he liked about Penn State saying, “it’s LBU and it’s close to home, and coach Franklin is cool.”
It’s good to see that the reputation of “Linebacker U” is still alive and well with the younger athletes coming into college football.
However, it seems like the rest of the schools in his top 10 have a lot of work to do.
He said to Fawcett, “I went up there recently and loved everything about it which is why I’m going again before my official.”
Penn State is listed with a less than 1% chance to sign the number one player in Maryland, but the Prediction Machine hasn’t been updated since he cut his list to 10.
It’s looking like it will be an uphill battle for the Nittany Lions to sign Chiles and keep him away from their rivals.
The facility hosted an NCAA Men’s Regional Championship in the spring of 2021.
This week will be a busy week for Seminole Legacy Golf Club.
For the first time during the 2023 golf season, the club will be hosting home tournaments for both Florida State men’s and women’s golf.
The men’s tournament, the Seminole Intercollegiate, will kick off with the first and second rounds of the tournament Monday. The third and final round is set for Tuesday, with an award ceremony scheduled for 3:30 p.m.
Boston College, VCU, Indiana, Lipscomb, Ole Miss, Troy, UAB, Southern Illinois, Arkansas State, Florida Atlantic, Florida Gulf Coast, Jacksonville, Lamar and Northern Alabama are also set to participate.
Men’s head coach Trey Jones is excited about the opportunity to host.
“It’s going be a lot of fun. It is. It’s a long time coming,” Jones said. “We hosted a regional here, right after we opened but we have not had a men’s tournament for the last couple of years.
“I know our players are looking forward to having your families in town and getting ready to show off what we feel is one of the best collision courses in the country.”
The Seminoles are led by three all-American golfers in redshirt juniors Cole Anderson, Brett Roberts and Frederik Kjettrup.
Anderson had a career-best performance at the Maui Jim Intercollegiate, finishing second at the Mirabel Golf Club, while Kjettrup won the Watersound Invitational by shooting an FSU three-round record 18-under par (66-67-65) and Roberts tied for ninth at the Watersound Invitational, shooting a 7-under 209 (68-67-74).
“The game feels good, just a couple of mistakes away from a few really good wins,” Anderson said. “I think everyone is rounding into form here. The plan is to keep progressing and getting better with each event. Obviously, you want to peak at the end of the spring.”
Florida State’s Seminole Legacy Club. (Photo: Courtesy of FSU Athletics)
Right after the men’s tournament wraps up, the women’s golf team will host the Florida State Match Up, starting Friday and running through Sunday.
While the men’s team has not hosted a tournament for a couple of years, the women also hosted the same tournament last season.
But this weekend will be the first opportunity to host one this season.
“It’s our only time all season we get to host something,” FSU women’s coach Amy Bond said. “The kids will get to sleep in their own bed, get to play in front of the home crowd.
“We’re pretty excited. Plus being here at Seminole Legacy, who can complain about this place? It’s a good test and we have a good field coming in.”
Florida State (15, Golfstat ranking from March 1) will host Kentucky (21), Kent State (35), Purdue (51), Oklahoma (56), Tulane (59), Notre Dame (81), Mercer (96), East Tennessee State (103), Coastal Carolina (128), Augusta (152) and Daytona State (2 – NJCAA) for the weekend.
The first of the three-round, 54-hole tournament kicks off Friday, with one round per day, with twelve teams teeing off in twosomes for the first two rounds and then in a final round shotgun in threesomes.
“I am really excited about it,” freshman Lottie Woad said. “This is my first year, so I haven’t played at home yet, so I am ready for it.”
The Seminoles have enjoyed success, finishing second at the IJGA Collegiate Invitational at the Guadalajara Country Club in Guadalajara, Mexico in early February.
They were playing in the Valspar Augusta Invitational at Forest Hills Golf Club in Augusta, Ga., last weekend.
Woad, along with junior Charlotte Heate are the leaders of the program.
“It’s been decent,” Heath said of the season so far. “There’s been some ups and downs. Some things have been achieved and some we’re still working on.
Golf course underwent a $10 million renovation
The university partnered with Nicklaus Design to redesign the 57-year-old course, located in southwest Tallahassee adjacent to Innovation Park. Legacy courses are designed by Nicklaus and his son Jack II.
While the course retained its name after Veller, the former FSU golf and football coach who passed away in 2006, it is also known as the Seminole Legacy Golf Club.
The renovation included a complete redesign of the golf course, with only one hole (the 18th) remaining from the original routing.
The university still owns the course, which is home to the Seminoles’ men’s and women’s golf teams. The facility hosted an NCAA Men’s Regional Championship in the spring of 2021.
“While this could not have been possible without the commitment and support from our university administration and generous donors, I truly believe we are not completely satisfied and we know the course will only continue to get better,” Jones said.
Originally designed by Bill Amick, the course opened in 1962.
It is currently operated by Troon, the world’s largest golf and golf-related hospitality management company, located in Scottsdale, Arizona.
Jim Henry of the Tallahassee Democrat contributed to this report.
The Seminoles safety lives up to his name Jammie. How does he look as a prospect?
Welcome to SKOL Search!
This series will be your guide to the 2023 draft class. From scouting reports to mock drafts and exploring different scenarios, we will be covering the NFL draft and the future of the Minnesota Vikings from all angles.
The focus of the draft class in this space will be on the Vikings’ major needs at wide receiver, running back, cornerback and both interior and edge pass rusher.
The Vikings are slated to have four picks before compensatory selections are awarded and they need to make the most out of them.
Oklahoma joins Alabama, Tennessee, and South Carolina to offer 2025 QB KJ Lacey.
The University of Oklahoma has cast a wide net for their pursuit of a quarterback for the 2025 recruiting class. That net got a bit wider with the Sooners sending an offer to 2025 QB K.J. Lacey out of Saraland, Alabama.
Lacey is slight in size as he currently stands 6-foot-1 and 165 pounds. He is a dynamic player, though, with a good arm that he uses to push the ball downfield. He can also make throws on the run, showing off excellent accuracy outside the pocket.
Lacey looks to have the attention of some high-profile programs already. He has offers from Alabama, Florida State, and Tennessee in addition to his OU offer. He is the third QB offer the Sooners have sent out for the class of 2025, joining [autotag]Kevin Sperry[/autotag] and [autotag]Cobey Sellers[/autotag].
The Oklahoma Sooners offered 2025 QB Kevin Sperry, and recruiting analysts from OUInsider at 247Sports issued crystal balls in OU’s favor.
Oklahoma was put in a bind last year when starting quarterback [autotag]Dillon Gabriel[/autotag] was unable to play after suffering a tough concussion in Oklahoma’s loss to TCU. Their scholarship quarterbacks weren’t good enough to run their offense. So the Sooners ran a wildcat-style offense during the Red River Showdown and were promptly shut out 49-0. It was downright embarrassing. However, the staff seemed to take that personally.
They’ve been aggressive in their pursuit of the quarterbacks they want, so they won’t be in a situation that dire again.
Five-star QB [autotag]Jackson Arnold[/autotag] is in the building. They are in hot pursuit of their quarterback for 2024, Michael Hawkins, and now, their 2025 QB target seems to have emerged.
Kevin Sperry out of Rock Hill High School in Prosper, Texas is a talented dual-threat signal caller and is tracking to be a top 2025 prospect. He was the Texas district 5-6A Offensive Newcomer of the Year as a sophomore.
With 20-plus offers, there’s no mistaking that Sperry will be one of the nation’s most coveted QBs in 2025. He has a strong arm, and the ball just effortlessly jumps off his fingers.
Jeff Lebby has obviously made an impression on Sperry, and two of 247Sports’ resident Oklahoma insiders believe the Sooners are already in the driver’s seat to land Sperry’s commitment.
Not only do they have the union advocating for their best interests, but they are being educated on how to advocate for themselves.
This Women’s History Month, I will be spotlighting women athletes and their achievements in college, after college, and beyond. Athletes are Humans First and while I want to highlight their athletic ability and achievements, I also want to point a spotlight on what they are doing off their field of play.
On Jan. 31st, 2022 at approximately 8.30 pm ET, the National Women’s Soccer League’s Players Association announced they had ratified the first-ever collective bargaining agreement in women’s soccer history. As the president of the association, Huster helped oversee the collective bargaining process.
“It’s a big focus of mine to make sure players know their rights and to make sure clubs are abiding by what is actually in the agreement. While the CBA is a historic moment for the league, there are plenty of areas up for interpretation within the agreement,” Huster said in a press release issued by her club, the Washington Spirit.
Huster started soccer at a young age and went on to play D1 soccer at Florida State University where she was a four-year starter, first-team Scholar All-American by the National Soccer Coaches Association of America in 2011, a third-team All-American, and first-team All-ACC in her final season at FSU.
She also shined in the classroom where she was the recipient of the Golden Torch Award for achieving the highest GPA among soccer student-athletes during the 2009-10 semester, was a four-time FSU Dean’s List honoree, and FSU President’s List – 4.0 GPA in the Spring of 2009. Huster initially thought she might want to be a physician’s assistant and even shadowed a few after college.
The league for professional women’s soccer in the United States folded in 2012 just as Huster was making her way into the league. She played for a few semi-professional leagues and then went overseas to play in Australia for one season. However, her professional soccer career was just taking off and she found she was destined to make history for women athletes around the world.
In 2013, the NWSL emerged and professional soccer was once again an option for players domestically. Huster was drafted by the Spirit with the club’s second pick in the 2013 NWSL Supplemental Draft.
“While Huster played with the Spirit, she took odd jobs to supplement her league pay, which she said was less than $20,000 per season for her first few years. She wrote articles, took photography gigs, trained youth players, coached for club teams, walked dogs, and worked as the executive assistant for a natural turf grass consultant at Maryland Soccerplex, the latter which helped her develop small business and organization skills that would translate to her work with the players association,” according to her interview with Club Eleven Magazine.
Taking odd jobs and working to make a living wage is not new to the world of women’s sports, so Huster had a first-hand understanding of the trials and tribulations players were facing to play the sport they loved.
I once worked at Amazon packing boxes during 10 hour days on my feet. Head to train younger girls in the evening. Train afterwards myself. All of this while raising my son. #TheStruggleIsNotfakehttps://t.co/iddWNQkLxj
Huster and her teammates worked through harassment and advocated for a change of ownership all while working their additional jobs and playing professional soccer. Something had to give.
“In past years, there has not been a place for players to go, or that they feel comfortable going if they have experienced sexual abuse, verbal abuse, any type of harassment,” Huster noted in her interview with Club Eleven Magazine. “The league in the past has said that they had a policy which they were not able to provide us at the beginning of this year, when we demanded that they put it into place right now before the start of the season. We believe that they may have been operating with US Soccer’s anti-harassment policy. But again, they didn’t provide that… If they were using it, players didn’t know, and players didn’t know where to go if they had issues.”
While the league has gone through its ups and downs, the players are always at the forefront of positive changes. That’s what having a union can do for athletes. Not only do they have the union advocating for their best interests, but they are being educated on how to advocate for themselves.
Fast forward to the end of 2021. The NWSLPA entered into a group licensing agreement with OneTeam Partners, entered into its first sponsorship agreements with Ally Bank and MasterCard, hired a business agent to manage business affairs, and entered into a Commercial Rights Agreement.
“I think that if we [the players, the NWSLPA] are able to empower other people to speak up… if we can be very transparent and honest about that process, individually, and as a collective, I think that gives other people the courage to do the same in whatever walk of life that they are living,” Huster told Club Eleven Magazine.
While the league is still relatively young, the players have taken the lead in advocating for their rights and Huster, along with her predecessors has helped pave the way. These players understand they are working for the greater good and might not see all the changes implemented during their playing careers or even their lifetimes.
“We’re going to be able to get things done that we could never have imagined before… because we’re not worried about the league crumbling down because we know that we are the league,” Huster told Club Eleven Magazine.
Oklahoma continues to plant its feet firmly in the Florida recruiting landscape as they offer four-star defensive tackle, D’Antre Robinson.
Florida was very lucrative to the Oklahoma Sooners in the class of 2023. With the staff’s comfort recruiting in the Sunshine State, it makes sense they would be right back there for the class of 2024.
The Class of 2023 gave the Sooners CB Makari Vickers (early enrollee), DL Derrick LeBlanc (early enrollee), LB Lewis Carter, WR Keyon Brown, and defensive lineman Markus Strong. All are from Florida. With that success, why would Oklahoma not go back to the well?
The Sooners believe they can replicate that success in 2024 and reached out to offer four-star defensive tackle D’Antre Robinson out of Orlando, Florida.
Robinson is a true space eater in the interior. He has decent lateral quickness and is disruptive at the point of attack. Robinson’s natural strength allows him to stonewall opposing offensive linemen and effectively eliminate them from moving him off his spot. That frees up his teammates to go and make plays and attack the ball carrier.
He played AAU basketball. The athleticism required to play basketball at that level is on full display. With his frame, it is reasonable to believe he could still add anywhere from 10-15 pounds if necessary. The extra pounds would help significantly if he plays along the interior for an SEC team.
FSU wants a bigger cut of revenue sharing. What could this mean for the ACC and the Seminoles’ future?
On Friday, Florida State athletic director Michael Alford spoke with the school’s board of trustees. “Something has to change,” he said according to a report from ESPN’s Adrea Adelson.
The big concern revolves around the media rights of the ACC. Alford believes that the Seminoles should receive a bigger cut of the revenue than what they are currently receiving in the deal that runs through 2036. Based on the current contract, each of the conference’s 14 schools receive an equal 7% share of the revenue.
According to Alford, Florida State contributes 15% of the value to the ACC. So why shouldn’t the Seminoles receive a larger cut? What this could mean is that the school is already looking at life beyond the ACC. But who would be willing to take on FSU? Perhaps it would be in the SEC where the other half of the Sunshine Showdown, the Florida Gators, already reside.
One way to combat the revenue distribution is an uneven split among the 14 schools. The Clemson Tigers and [autotag]Florida State Seminoles[/autotag] are among the biggest brands that would likely see a larger cut. The Miami Hurricanes and North Carolina Tar Heels could find themselves on that next wave as well. At one time the Virginia Tech Hokies would be among the top brands but the program has fallen off since Frank Beamer’s retirement.
I am not sure how the rest of the league would feel about getting less money to keep top teams happy. But it feels like this could coming to a head soon. Either the ACC looks to keep the big dogs satisfied or we could see more realignment in the very near future.
