It took Oklahoma football over a half century to establish a nationally recognized, even feared, championship brand, but Sooner softball has managed to forge a national reputation and dynastic standing in half that time.
No team in NCAA Division I softball has been more dominant in the sport this century than Patty Gasso's Oklahoma Sooners. Since capturing their first national championship in 2000, the Sooners have a winning percentage of .833 and a cumulative record of 1,378-276-2. Along the way, they have made the NCAA Tournament every season and accumulated eight national championships, including seven in the last 11 seasons the WCWS has been held.
Softball isn't as old as other Oklahoma athletic programs, but it's clearly made the most of its time thanks to Patty Gasso
While Oklahoma's monstrous claim to fame in softball has mostly been the magnificent work of Gasso over the past 25 years, the foundation for the program dates back 25 years earlier to 1975.
The inaugural game of Oklahoma intercollegiate softball was played on March 19, 1975, with OU defeating Oklahoma Baptist 3-1. The Sooners posted a 14-6 record that debut season under head coach Amy Dahl, who coached just two seasons before turning the reins over to Marita Hynes. Among the mostly regional teams on the schedule that first season were softball squads from Central Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and Southwestern.
Oklahoma made the Women's College World Series in its very first season. The WCWS included 18 teams back then in a double-elimination tournament format. The Sooners' stay was short-lived, however. losing 5-0 to Northern Iowa in the first round, followed by a 9-2 loss to Texas Women's in the loser's bracket.
The Sooners also made WCWS appearances in 1981, 1982 and 1983 during Hynes' eight seasons at the helm (1977-84), but did not make another WCWS appearance until Gasso's sixth season in 2000. OU won its second national championship that season and has been back to the WCWS in Oklahoma City 17 times since, including each of the last eight seasons.
Two other head coaches, Michelle Thomas (1985-93) and Jim Beitia (1994), preceded Gasso on the job, but it will be the native Californian Gasso, the fifth head coach in Sooner softball history, whose name will forever be enshrined with Oklahoma softball. Gasso's 1,623 wins in 32 seasons at OU, the third most in NCAA softball history, represents 67% of the school's total wins (2,419) in softball.
For the first 22 seasons, Reaves Park, located near the OU campus, served as the home of Sooner softball until Marita Hynes Stadium opened in 1998, offering around 1,100 more seats than the facility at Reaves Park. For the past three seasons, of course, the team has played its games at the spacious new Love's Field, the largest on-campus softball stadium in college softball with a seating capacity of 4,200.
With eight national championships in softball, all of which have come in the past 25 seasons, Oklahoma is tied with Arizona for the second most all-time. UCLA sits in the top spot with 12 national titles.
Six of Oklahoma's eight national titles have come in the eight-year stretch from 2016 to 2014, including an NCAA record four consecutive from 2021 to 2024. With the 2013 national title, the Sooners have won seven of the last 11.
UCLA won six national titles from 1982 to 1990 and seven of 11 from 1982 to 1992. Arizona's best championship run was 1991 to 1997 in which the Wildcats claimed five of seven national titles.
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