Kara Dill has been UTA softball’s head coach since 2022. Dill is the 10th to hold the position in the program.
Intercollegiate head coaches juggle long hours, constant travel and relentless pressure, but for UTA softball head coach Kara Dill, the challenge is worth doubling.
In November, Dill assumed her second head coaching role with the Carolina Blaze in the Athletes Unlimited Softball League, a professional women’s summer softball league, following her role as associate head coach in the league’s inaugural year.
“To have the opportunity to stay in the league and continue to grow the league,” Dill said. “What this would look like in 10 years is just so exciting to be a part of, that it could be sustainable for these athletes to be professional athletes.”
Athletes Unlimited, co-founded by Jon Patricof and Jonathan Soros in 2020, operates as a parent organization for leagues in women’s professional sports including softball, volleyball and basketball. The organization is also the first professional sports league to be organized as a public benefit corporation.
Some of the leagues within the organization foster a unique format in which players are stakeholders, share company profits, help shape policies and compete for individual points rather than strictly on team standings. Those leagues’ teams are formed by the player who accumulated the most points that week, who becomes team captain and makes all the decisions.
This article was featured in the Feb. 4 print
“The premise was to give female athletes empowerment to make the decisions that best fit their career,” said Dana Sorensen, Carolina Blaze general manager. “It originally was athlete-driven, meaning that when our league first started, before AUSL, it was players drafting players, players selecting teams, captains were selecting the teams out of the draft pool and then they were making all the on-field decisions. There really was no coaches.”
Before the formation of the new softball league in 2025, Athletes Unlimited had one known as the AU Pro Softball Championship Season, now called the AUSL All-Star Cup. It also holds a condensed two-week, 18-game season known as the Athletes Unlimited X. Both have operated under the player-run format.
Sorensen said that while this structure gave power to the athletes, it was difficult for fans to keep track due to a lack of a team mindset. The Athletes Unlimited Softball League opted to run with the traditional formatting, having coaches and managers do the legwork that allows teams to function similarly to college ball, she said.
Memorabilia sits on UTA softball head coach Kara Dill’s office shelf. Dill was formerly an assistant coach for Texas A&M University.
Entering the 2026 season, the league has transitioned to be fully city-based, hosting six teams across the country: the Carolina Blaze, the Chicago Bandits, the Texas Volts, the Utah Talons, along with the newly added Portland Cascade and Oklahoma City Spark.
Dill joined Sorensen with the Blaze in its first season, joining head coach Alisa Goler and the team’s two assistant coaches, Sue Kunkle and Ryan Wondrasek. Now, as head coach, Dill will work alongside Sorensen with a growing roster of 13 athletes in the 2026 season.
“She’s incredibly smart, and the one thing I really appreciate about her is she will observe situations before she will step in and speak,” Sorensen said. “On the professional setting, that was really important, because there’s a lot of decisions you have to make.”
Sorensen noted Dill’s coaching background, touching on the four back-to-back Women’s College World Series she’s been part of. She said any of the coaches Dill has been with during those times will tell just how great a coach she is.
“They’re so confident in who she is as a person, so that’s reassuring when you have people that have won as many games as they all have,” Sorensen said. “Not a lot of coaches her age are going to have those glowing recommendations from that many Hall of Fame coaches.”
Dill laughed while she said being a head coach for two teams wasn’t something she really thought about. Noting the people and opportunities around her, Dill said being a coach is something she was certain she always wanted; now she’s doing it at two of the highest levels.
“I have a very small group of people that I rely on for wisdom in this coaching world and trying to navigate it,” Dill said. “I rely a lot on just a couple of those people who have the vision that I don’t have. They’ve just been around longer. They have more wisdom than I have.”
One of the most impactful mentors she has had was her former coach at the University of Kentucky, Rachel Lawson.
“She’s just somebody I continue to go back to. She always has what’s best for me in mind, which, in the coaching world, is hard to do because you’re competitors with everybody,” Dill said. “But she has just been a rock for me.”
In terms of balancing her UTA and pro league coaching duties, the UTA softball team doesn’t feel the absence of their leader since the team isn’t there during the summer, she said. Much of the offseason is dedicated to recruiting, a responsibility largely handled by Hunter Bunch, assistant coach and recruiting coordinator.
Memorabilia of all the schools where UTA softball head coach Kara Dill has coached sit on her office shelf. Dill’s alma mater is the University of Kentucky.
Bunch described the coaching staff’s relationship as an “I got you, no worries” dynamic and said the program operates like a family. The primary shift when Dill is coaching another team, he said, is that he has taken a more hands-on role in extending offers and meeting with recruits and their parents, responsibilities previously handled by Dill.
“It’s a unique opportunity for coach Dill. She’s a phenomenal human being and a great coach, great leader, and she’s wired to do it,” Bunch said. “It’s going to be challenging from getting pulled both ways, but I think what she does a good job of is surrounding her with people that can help her fill those voids when she’s not present.”
Recruiting being affected by Dill’s absence in the summer factored into her decision to hire Bunch. While Bunch fills those gaps in person, Dill said, she aids the program remotely whenever possible through technology.
“The league understands, too, if I need to come back on a day off or a practice day to do a visit,” she said. “Both groups are very supportive of me doing the other.”
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