OKLAHOMA CITY — Mike Stith sat inside the batting cage at his Anaheim training facility on Monday afternoon, the ping of practice audible over the phone line carrying his voice to Oklahoma City.
Even though he is far away from the Women’s College World Series, a part of his heart is in OKC.
That’s because so many of his players are at the Women’s College World Series.
“They all played together,” said Stith, who leads the mega travel softball program, the Orange County Batbusters, “and to watch them compete all together, to say I’m proud … is kind of an understatement.”
Before the WCWS began, the Batbuster alums in the tournament took a picture together – 15 players from different teams – but the biggest concentration was Oklahoma.
Seven are now Sooners, including five everyday starters.
They have developed a softball dynasty, winning the past three national championships. After surviving an extra-inning, 6-5 nail-biter against Florida on Tuesday, second-seeded Oklahoma will go for an unprecedented fourth national title in a row starting Wednesday in the best-of-three championship series against top-seeded Texas.
If Oklahoma makes history, it will have been fed by a California pipeline.
It began in 2015 with Sydney Romero.
While the Batbusters had been cranking out elite softball players for many years before that – Olympians Jennie Finch and Laura Berg are program alums – none had ever gone to Oklahoma. And the Sooners had recruited players from California as they built themselves into a national power, winning national titles in 2000 and 2013.
But shortly after that second national title, Sooners coach Patty Gasso decided she wanted Batbusters, starting with Romero. Gasso had spent several years trying to bring Romero’s older sister to Oklahoma, but Sierra Romero ultimately chose Michigan, where she became a three-time All-American.
Gasso was heartbroken to lose Sierra Romero but felt like she’d gotten in late on Romero’s recruiting.
“So, I made it a point that I was going to be first in line for Syd Romero,” Gasso said a few years ago of the Vista Murrieta High star.
Gasso not only got Romero but also fellow Batbuster Falepolima Aviu from Rancho Buena Vista High in Vista.
As freshmen in 2016, they started and hit in the heart of a lineup that won the national championship. It was the first of two in a row for the Sooners and kickstarted a run of five of seven national titles going to Norman.
The dynasty has been fueled by Southern California Sooners.
This season, four of OU’s five everyday infield starters are Californians: catcher Kinzie Hansen (Norco High), first baseman Cydney Sanders (San Marcos High), shortstop Tiare Jennings (St. Anthony High in Long Beach) and third baseman Alyssa Brito (Pacifica High in Garden Grove).
Also in the lineup regularly is designated player Ella Parker (Notre Dame High in Sherman Oaks).
All of those players are Batbuster alums, too, as is outfielder Hannah Coor (Anaheim’s Esperanza High). The Sooner boast another Southern California transplant, Quincee Lilio from Great Oak High in Temecula, though she played travel ball for Athletics Mercado-Smith.
What does it mean to Stith?
“All the screaming and yelling and demanding and frustrating times and the prodding and pushing of all these kids all the time and the uncomfortable times you have trying to build them, what it means is they were listening,” he said with a chuckle. “They may not have been acting like it, but they were paying attention.”
Stith takes particular pride in his Sooners, but he has had kids all over this year’s WCWS. On Monday, Batbuster alum Reagan Walsh (South Torrance High) hit a homer in Florida’s win against Oklahoma. On Tuesday, fellow Batbuster Jocelyn Erickson, from Arizona, did the same for the Gators.
Parker, a freshman and one of Erickson’s best friends, had a home run of her own and drove in three runs for the Sooners on Tuesday.
“People don’t understand – these are best of friends,” Stith said.
They text each other before the game and hug longer after it, but during the game, they are all business.Stith recalled a 2017 Women’s College World Series championship series game between Oklahoma and Florida that went 17 innings. The Sooners ultimately won, but in the 12th inning, the Gators were down to their final strike when former Moorpark High star Amanda Lorenz drove in two runs on a ball that missed clearing the wall by inches.
Lorenz slid into third, where former Batbuster teammate Sydney Romero was waiting.
“And Sydney Romero shoves her and is laughing,” Stith said. “And I can read her lips.”
“’You’ve got to be (freaking) kidding me that you just hit that ball,’” Stith remembers Romero saying.
Those are the types of things that stick with Stith. Sure, having players in the Women’s College World Series is great. Of course, being the power behind the sport’s current dynasty is rewarding.
But seeing the relationships continue takes all of it to another level.
“Our world is filled with people that don’t want others to be successful, and we try to train them that whenever somebody else does good, that’s good on them,” Stith said.
“You got to just beat them.”
