Florida repeats as champion
OKLAHOMA CITY — Florida got everything right — except its championship celebration.
As the Gators reveled in their second consecutive national softball title following their 4-1 victory over Michigan on Wednesday night, Lauren Haeger and Coach Tim Walton participated in postgame interviews. Two players tried to douse them with Gatorade, but the bucket was too heavy. They ended up just getting Walton’s ankles wet.
The resilient Gators even recovered from that. Well after the game ended, Florida players huddled in a circle, swayed back and forth in unison and sang “We Are The Champions.”
Haeger capped one of the most dominant careers in women’s college softball by giving up just five hits and striking out five. She became the third player to be both national player of the year and the most outstanding player at the Women’s College World Series. She hit .571 in the World Series with 3 home runs, 7 RBI and 6 walks in 6 games. As a pitcher, she went 4-1 and allowed just 6 earned runs in 36 innings.
“When you work hard, good things happen to you,” she said. “I’m so thankful to be a Gator. It’s been a great time.”
Florida became just the third program to repeat as champion, and the first since Arizona in 2006-2007. The Gators came back after losing 1-0 on Tuesday.
“We used it as motivation,” Haeger said. “We realized this isn’t going to be handed to us and we really needed to work hard. Michigan is a great team. And we just had a different attitude today. You could see it in our eyes. You could see it in each other, you could hear it in our conversations. We were a different team. We were who we are today. And I couldn’t be more proud of my teammates.”
After the final out, the players threw their gloves up in the air, and Haeger jumped up and down excitedly in the pitcher’s circle before she was rushed and the team formed a pile.
Justine McLean had two hits and Taylor Schwarz knocked in two runs for Florida (60-7).
Michigan (60-8) was going for its first title since 2005. Haylie Wagner, who shut out Florida on Tuesday to keep the Wolverines alive, got the loss. Megan Betsa allowed just one hit and didn’t yield a run in four innings of relief.