With back-to-back national championships under their belts, the historic senior class of Texas softball will now move on. Some are leveling up their games to the professional level; others will enter the workforce with just the memories of being on the diamond.<\/p>\n
However, they will be remembered by Longhorn fans as legends: players who brought two national championship trophies back to Austin.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s difficult to discuss Texas softball without mentioning their senior catcher Reese Atwood.<\/p>\n
Known for her clutch moments on both defense and offense, Atwood was a staple of the Longhorns\u2019 roster throughout her four years at the University.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019s just such a focal point of this program. She\u2019s the definition of what it means to be a Texas Longhorn,\u201d junior infielder Katie Stewart said. \u201cThose records aren\u2019t a fluke, she\u2019s just worked so hard, and so it\u2019s such an inspiration to be able to take the same field as her.\u201d<\/p>\n
Atwood, who broke the record for career home runs during the home season opener, slammed a total of 74 long balls in her time as a Longhorn, 19 of which were during her senior season.<\/p>\n
\u00a0In her final remarks after her last game as a Longhorn, the usual stoic demeanor of Atwood broke down to reveal an athlete with immense love for the sport and her team.<\/p>\n
\u201cGoing back to being recruited to Texas, it was just such a dream come true to me,\u201d Atwood said. \u201cTo have a coach like (head) coach (Mike) White that never lost faith in me and was able to develop me for years and just make me into the absolute best player that I could be, I\u2019m just so incredibly grateful.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her time behind the plate isn\u2019t coming to a close. It\u2019ll be a quick turnaround, jumping on a plane to go join the Carolina Blaze at Smith Family Stadium on June 9.<\/p>\n
Senior infielder Leighann Goode won\u2019t be traveling far as her last season wearing burnt orange comes to a close. She begins her Athletes Unlimited Softball League career on June 9 after being selected by the Texas Volts as the eighth pick of the 2026 AUSL Draft\u2019s second round.<\/p>\n
Goode played an important part in Texas\u2019 uphill battle at Devon Park after the team dropped its first game of the double-elimination tournament.<\/p>\n
Starting in 62 games her senior season, Goode was an anchor at second base, accumulating a .970 fielding percentage while also racking up 55 hits and 40 RBIs throughout the season.<\/p>\n
With all the press about Texas\u2019 star pitcher, junior Teagan Kavan, it\u2019s easy to forget that senior pitcher Citlaly Gutierrez played a huge part in the season\u2019s success. Gutierrez came through in the first game of a do-or-die doubleheader against Tennessee to send Texas to the finals. At the finals, she only allowed Texas Tech to score one earned run, giving Kavan\u2019s arm a rest to later pitch five strikeouts in the last two innings of the championship game.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe trusted in Citlaly Gutierrez to get us through,\u201d White said. \u201c(She) was focused on what she could do to help this team.\u201d<\/p>\n
Senior outfielders Kaiah Altmeyer Ashton Maloney, and junior infielder Victoria Hunter also had their standout moments in the postseason.<\/p>\n
Hunter, as a pinch hitter against ASU in the Austin Super Regional, hit the season-saving two-run bomb in game two to allow Texas to advance to the Women\u2019s College World Series. Altmeyer, although not a consistent face in the Texas order, cemented her spot in the second game of the WCWS against Mississippi State with her first career bomb as a Longhorn. Maloney, who had consistency struggles at the plate this season, still registered a .981 fielding percentage with 45 putouts.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With back-to-back national championships under their belts, the historic senior class of Texas softball will now move on.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":328740,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[27,29,28],"class_list":["post-328739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=328739"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328739\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/328740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=328739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=328739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=328739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}