NCAA Women's College World Series starts Thursday in Devon Park

Devon Park in Oklahoma City, USA, will take centre stage once again with the opening day of the NCAA Women's College World Series. The eight-team double elimination bracket begins on Thursday, 29 May, with the first four games of the competition. The stadium, softball venue of the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games, will be the main stage for the WBSC U-18 Women's Softball World Cup Finals in September.

Here’s the schedule for Day 1:

• Game 1: No. 6 Texas vs. No. 3 Florida
• Game 2: No. 7 Tennessee vs. No. 2 Oklahoma
• Game 3: Ole Miss vs. No. 12 Texas Tech
• Game 4: No. 16 Oregon vs. No. 9 UCLA

The Championship Finals—a best-of-three series between the top two teams remaining—will begin on June 4. Game 2 is set for the following day, and if necessary, a decisive Game 3 will take place on June 6.

ESPN will broadcast the entire event live. The Women’s College World Series has seen significant growth in viewership over recent years. Last year’s Championship Finals between Texas and Oklahoma drew a record-breaking two million viewers across ESPN platforms, marking the most-watched Women’s College World Series Finals in history. That figure represented a 24% increase from 2023 and surpassed the previous all-time high set in 2015 by 3%.

In addition to viewership milestones, last year’s final game at Devon Park drew a record 12,324 fans, the highest attendance ever for an NCAA Championship Finals game. The Oklahoma Sooners defeated the Texas Longhorns to claim their fourth consecutive national title—an unprecedented feat in NCAA softball history.

Arkansas’ Bri Ellis earns 2025 USA Softball Collegiate Player of the Year Award

University of Arkansas Bri Ellis received the USA Softball Collegiate Player of the Year award on Tuesday, at the 2025 NCAA Softball Women’s College World Series banquet in Oklahoma City.

“This award means so much to softball history and to be cemented into softball history forever is unreal,” said Ellis. “It means so much and I’m super proud of myself and my team. I thank them for helping me because there are no individual awards without team success. All of my coaches were super important in my process and I will thank them until the day I die,” she added.

Bri Ellis has had an outstanding season at the plate, leading the nation with a slugging percentage of 1.142 and an on-base percentage of .646. Throughout the 2025 season, Ellis held a batting average of .457 with 58 hits, which included nine doubles and 26 home runs, over 72 RBI plate appearances, totaling 145 bases. Her OPS of 1.788 is on track to become the best in NCAA history since the metric was first recorded in 2016.

Previous winners of the USA Softball Collegiate Player of the Year include Stacey Nuveman (UCLA – 2002), Cat Osterman (Texas – 2003, 2005, 2006), Jessica Van der Linden (Florida State – 2004), Monica Abbott (Tennessee – 2007), Angela Tincher (Virginia Tech – 2008), Danielle Lawrie (Washington – 2009, 2010), Ashley Hansen (Stanford – 2011), Keilani Ricketts (Oklahoma – 2012, 2013), Lacey Waldrop (Florida State – 2014), Lauren Haeger (Florida – 2015), Sierra Romero (Michigan – 2016), Kelly Barnhill (Florida – 2017), Rachel Garcia (UCLA – 2018, 2019), Jocelyn Alo (Oklahoma – 2021, 2022), Valerie Cagle (2023) and most recently, NiJaree Canady (2024).