The Women's College World Series Championship Is Today. You Should Watch It

Honestly the title of this blog post should be enough, but let's go over everything just to be sure.

Today the Oklahoma Sooners and Florida State Seminoles will play the deciding game in their best-of-3 championship series to crown a college softball national championship at 3 p.m. EST on ESPN. The road here has been an exciting one, and the finish will hopefully be the most thrilling game yet. Despite both being yearly contenders for this title each year, it wasn't an easy road. Both teams had to battle out of the loser's bracket after losing their opening games in Oklahoma City. This meant having to win four straight elimination games, some of them against the best teams remaining in the field. Both teams also had to deal with several rain delays and postponements, but they rose to the occasion, winning decisively in some cases. In fact, this tournament will mark the first time since the current format was adopted in 2005 that 17 games will be played in Oklahoma City, the maximum number possible. 

So you could argue this was the most hard-fought WCWS we've ever seen. We deserve it after not having a tournament at all in 2019. 

Frankly it's not all too surprising these are the two teams here. The Sooners have made it to OKC eight of the past 9 years, taking the trophy home three times. And since it is their home state, the crowd is on a whole new level when they're here. 

National Player of the Year things 💁‍♀️ @78jocelyn_alo

📺 @espn#WCWS x @OU_Softball pic.twitter.com/wffVMB8YXn

— NCAA Softball (@NCAAsoftball) June 10, 2021

And this Sooners team could be even better than the ones we've seen in the past. Their bats are lethal, leading the country in slugging and home runs. The loss in Game 1 of the Championship Series was just OU's fourth loss of the season. All four times they lost they beat that same team the next time they played. But beating the Seminoles a second time won't be as easy.

Florida State's road to the championship game wasn't as dominant as Oklahoma's, but might be just as impressive. They rely far more on their pitching than their batting, spearheaded by ace Kathryn Sandercock. They battled their way through a tough Super Regional on the road against LSU, winni both games by a single run in the final innings. But ever since getting the OKC, their bats have come alive. All of a sudden, they have the firepower to match OU, and the pitching to slow them down. 

That was the story in Game 1 where the Seminoles' massive fourth inning gave them a 7-run lead. Oklahoma would chip away, but run out of time. However, the Sooners were too good to stay down two games in a row. In the clip you saw above, National Player of the Year Jocelyn Alo hit a home run that didn't just give Oklahoma the decisive lead, but set a college softball record by being the team's 159th (!!!) home run hit this season.

Chances are they still have a few left in them. And you'd be doing yourself a disservice by not tuning in to see.