Texas Tech is reloading.
Just a week after losing to Texas in a three-game series in the championship stage of the Women’s College World Series, the Red Raiders are doing all they can to assemble a squad more than capable of getting back to Oklahoma City next year.
In addition to reportedly re-signing ace pitcher NiJaree Canady to another NIL deal worth north of $1 million, the Red Raiders have now added five of the best players in college softball via the transfer portal. According to the site On3, Texas Tech has landed four of the top 10 players available in the portal, and a fifth that ranks inside the top 30. Three of the players joining Texas Tech were stars on other teams that competed in this year’s World Series.
Leading the pack of new players coming to Lubbock is Kaitlyn Terry, the sophomore who was not only UCLA’s best pitcher this season, but also a solid two-way player who tallied 35 hits and 30 runs scored. Terry, a lefthander, was 11th nationally in strikeout-to-walk ratio with a 5.06 mark. From the circle, Terry went 20-5 with a 2.64 ERA and 172 strikeouts.
On3 ranked Terry as the third-best player in the softball portal. The fourth-best player is joining Texas Tech too, as Tennessee third baseman Taylor Pannell is also taking her talents to Lubbock. The All-American redshirt sophomore was the top hitter for the Lady Vols this season, posting a 1.240 OPS, a .398 batting average, 74 hits, 34 walks, 16 homers and 65 RBI.
Pannell will be a big boost to the Red Raiders’ batting order, as will On3’s sixth-best transfer, Ohio State catcher Jasmyn Burns, who ranked fourth nationally in home runs this season with 25 dingers, which set a single-season program record for the Buckeyes. The All-American sophomore was eighth nationally in batting average with a .455 mark, 14th in RBI (72), fifth in slugging percentage (1.006), fifth in total bases (166), and seventh in OPS (1.546).
Mia Williams brings a big bat to Texas Tech too, as she — On3’s seventh-best ranked transfer — joins the Red Raiders from Florida. The daughter of former Florida basketball player and NBA champion Jason Williams, the sophomore second baseman posted a 1.144 OPS, 61 hits, 52 runs, 19 homers and 44 RBI for the Gators. She too was an All-American.
And finally, Texas Tech also brought in Jackie Lis, a three-time All-Missouri Valley Conference First Team selection and former MVP of the league. The junior shortstop led Southern Illinois to three MVC regular season titles and in just three seasons she set the program record for career home runs with 44. This year, she had 58 hits, 48 RBI, 33 walks and a .358 batting average. On3 ranked her as the 28th-best player in the portal.
It’s easy to draw the conclusion that Texas Tech was able to attract this much talent to its softball program because of the money it is putting up for NIL and revenue sharing. According to a recent report from CBS Sports, the Red Raiders will pay their players — across all sports — this upcoming year a combined $55 million in NIL and revenue sharing. That might mean Texas Tech is spending more than any other Division I school in the country.
It’s worth noting that Terry, Burns and Williams thanked the Matador Club — Texas Tech’s NIL collective — in their social media posts announcing their commitments to the Red Raiders.
At most Power 4 programs across the country, the money from revenue sharing via the House Settlement will be spent mostly on football first and then men’s basketball. At many schools, women’s basketball will likely get the third biggest amount of that revenue sharing pie, with what remains being sprinkled across non-revenue-generating sports. But Texas Tech is seemingly — and perhaps, smartly — exploiting a market inefficiency. No other program in the country seems to be spending on softball in the same way that the Red Raiders are. That could generate not only an increase in fan support, but also create an easier road to a national championship.
Arguably the best player remaining in softball’s transfer portal is Belmont pitcher Maya Johnson, who ranks as the eighth best transfer available according to On3. The left-handed All-American junior led all Division I pitchers in multiple statistical categories this season, including strikeouts (366), strikeout-to-walk ratio (16.64), shutouts (11), strikeouts per seven innings (12.4), and walks allowed per seven innings (.74).
Fortunately for the rest of college softball, Texas Tech doesn’t seem to need a third ace pitcher with Canady and Terry already onboard.
