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Today we’re talking about softball and NIL.

Last week in this space, I opined about the intrigue us college sports fans were getting from the 2025 NCAA Softball Championship. Mainly due to the fact that Texas Tech – a perennial afterthought of a program – spent over $1 million in NIL packaging to bring the nation’s best pitcher and possibly overall player to their team from Stanford last offseason.

Surely, a school couldn’t simply buy their way into an NCAA title, could they?

Don’t look now, but Texas Tech is about to show it can be done, indeed.

As I detailed last week, the investment paid off handsomely as the Red Raiders not only advanced out of the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament for the first time in program history, they also reached their first-ever Women’s College World Series.

The feat has been achieved largely on the arm of their star purchase – er, I mean, transfer – pitcher NiJaree Canady, who has pitched virtually every out the entire tournament and has the Red Raiders into the championship series against Texas. The best of three series begins tonight, and you can rest assured Canady will be in the circle until her arm falls off. Or, until the Longhorns pound her into submission – which is about as likely as me winning the PowerBall.

Personally, I think I’m okay with Tech winning it all. Why not? It gives programs like Mizzou hope. Programs that have had to grind forever with the mere hope of catching fire in a magical season. Now, we know that if you can attract the right impact player, it can make that much of a difference.

I recognize this is likely an outlier, and we’re not going to see lower-tier programs suddenly winning natties right and left just because they spent some free agent money. But if Tech wins this, it’s undoubtedly a watershed moment that will provide a non-traditional blueprint for how it can be done.

You can bet there will be tons of coaches tuning in tonight with just as much curiosity as us fans.

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• Nate Edwards offered up an extensive pre-season look at annoying rival South Carolina…

Beamer can recruit stars but his talent evals always felt wrong…until last year, of course! If he’s finally turned the road and started making better additions, and finally has a quarterback that can unshackle the restraints, then maybe we finally have a rival who is able to trade blows in the win/loss column…

The “annoying” was my interjection, is there a more annoying opposing coach to watch stomp around and act like a buffoon than Carolina’s Shane Beamer? That’s a rhetorical question, by the way…

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Tim Fuller is back with the Mizzou Men’s Basketball program. After serving as an assistant coach for the Tigers from 2011-2015, he returns as the program’s first general manager…

Fuller can recruit. Remember a dude named Jordan Clarkson?…

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• The summer SBN Reacts fan poll asks for your confidence level on both sides of the football for Mizzou in 2025. Be sure to vote and come back for the results!

Throughout the year we ask questions of the most plugged-in Missouri Tigers fans and fans across the country. Sign up here to participate in the weekly emailed surveys.

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Rock M Radio: Drinking the Recruiting Kool-Aid?

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As SEC commissioner, Greg Sankey remains among the most influential voices in college football, and a preeminent decision-maker when it comes to how the future of college athletics will look. It’s because of that authority that Sankey’s opinion about the next iteration of the expanded College Football Playoff carries more weight than almost any other.

Coming out of last week’s 2025 SEC Spring Meetings in Destin, Fla., Sankey put the league’s support behind a Big 12-backed “5+11” 16-team model for the expanded CFP that features 11 at-large bids along with the five highest-ranked conference champions. It was in direct opposition to the Big Ten-backed “4-4-2-2-1” 16-team model that granted four automatic bids for both the Big Ten and SEC and two apiece for the ACC and Big 12, which the latter two leagues have thoroughly rejected.

For his part, Sankey made it clear he’s never been in support of “automatic bids.”

“I’ve been one that said over time, I’d give no allocation. … I’d just make it the 12 best teams. And I was clear on that,” Sankey said on Monday’s Dan Patrick Show on Peacock. “Now, when we get into rooms, we make political compromises if you will … to achieve an outcome. … But we spent so much time expanding and working through our own little side arguments — about teams, and aw we can’t do this, we need this, you’ve got to protect this bowl game or that bowl game — that we never went back to the essence of decision-making, which is how are teams selected.

“As everyone relocated over the last 4-5 years, do the analyses that existed and worked for the four-team playoff in 2014 still have the same relevance? And we’re behind that curve in my opinion. That’s why other ideas are introduced and considered. And we’ve looked at ideas,” Sankey continued before pivoting to a repeated criticism of last season’s CFP format. “You know this allocation of what’s called automatic bids, that’s such a harsh term. I think allocations is … I like that word. Because we’ve already allocated. Look at last year, we had two teams not in the Top 4 that get to move up because of the political compromise. So we have a team outside the 12 that moves in and then the teams that are displaced look around and say, ‘Hey wait a second. That doesn’t make sense any longer.’ That introduces the questions around should that model continue or should that allocation expand where other teams are brought in?”

Automatic bids — or “allocations” as Sankey prefers — have been widely repudiated by fans and college football coaches alike since the Big Ten pushed it during their Spring meetings early last month.

During the ACC Spring Meetings last month,  Miami coach Mario Cristobal publicly rejected the “4-4-2-2-1” proposal three weeks ago: “Granting spots, that makes zero sense. Football has never been about gifting. It’s about earning.”

Added Pitt‘s Pat Narduzzi: “I think you should earn your way in. It comes down to the image of the Big Ten and SEC and where they are and there’s a lack of respect for the ACC. I don’t like it.”

In at least that respect, the SEC and the ACC are in full agreement.

Today we’re talking about softball and NIL.

Last week in this space, I opined about the intrigue us college sports fans were getting from the 2025 NCAA Softball Championship. Mainly due to the fact that Texas Tech – a perennial afterthought of a program – spent over $1 million in NIL packaging to bring the nation’s best pitcher and possibly overall player to their team from Stanford last offseason.

Surely, a school couldn’t simply buy their way into an NCAA title, could they?

Don’t look now, but Texas Tech is about to show it can be done, indeed.

Three members of the Clarkson University Baseball team and five more from the Clarkson University Softball program were rewarded for their excellence on the field and in the classroom as the 2024-25 College Sports Communicator Academic All-District teams were announced.

The 2025 Academic All-District® Baseball/Softball Teams, selected by College Sports Communicators, recognize the nation’s top student-athletes for their combined performances in athletics and in the classroom. The CSC Academic All-America® program separately recognizes honorees in four divisions — NCAA Division I, NCAA Division II, NCAA Division III and NAIA. Selections must have a 3.50 grade-point average or better with at least sophomore athletic and academic standing to be considered. Additionally, nominees must compete in at least 90% of athletic competitions, or start 66% of a program’s games.

From the Golden Knights’ baseball team, sophomores Seth Albert, Jacob Shriley, and Beau Vardion received the honor, while seniors Elizabeth Greco, Zoey Kovach, Emma Sabourin, and Elissa Uveino, as well as sophomore Isabel Haspil, earned the nod for the Clarkson Softball program. 

Seth Albert, a Financial Information and Analysis major, spent most of the season in the leadoff spot for the Golden Knights, scoring 26 runs and ranking second on the team with nine stolen bases in 11 tries. 

Jacob Shirley, a Mechanical Engineering major, tossed 38 innings for the Knights striking out 25 along the way, making six starts and four relief appearances. 

Beau Vardion, a Data Science major, was named a d3baseball.com All-Region selection and was also picked as a Liberty League All-Star after a breakout season in which he led the team with a .382 average and a .657 slugging percentage thanks to four home runs and 32 RBI. 

Elizabeth Greco, a Civil Engineering major, ranked third on the team with 15 walks and drove in 15 runs thanks to 18 hits in her senior campaign for the Knights. 

Isabel Haspil, an Aerospace Engineering and Mechanical Engineering double major, set a program record for free passes in her sophomore year, reaching base on 19 walks to help deliver a .333/.441/.465 batting line, scoring 25 runs and driving in 18 more. 

Zoey Kovach, an Engineering and Management major, finished off her career with another Liberty League all-star campaign, her third in four seasons, while also being named NFCA All-Region for the second time. She hit .363/.397/.487 and tied for the team lead with 41 hits. 

Emma Sabourin, a Chemical Engineering major, was a standout in center field once again as one of the top defenders in the league, while also contributing on offense with 17 runs scored and 14 more driven in. 

Elissa Uveino, a Mechanical Engineering major, ended up hitting .316/.374./357 with a team-best seven stolen bases while also scoring 21 runs. She closed her career with a .325 batting average, one of only eight players with at least 150 at bats to do so for the Knights.