UCF’s best overall team this 2015-16 academic year is quite possibly the UCF softball team.
The Knights are back-to-back American Conference champions with one of the country’s best pitchers in Shelby Turnier in the circle most of the game and a lot of pressure to continue the strong run for the Knights.
This is an experienced squad that is a perennial NCAA tournament team after a 50-9 team last year. There are several seniors returning including Turnier, home run hitter Jessica Ujvari and infielder Samantha McCloskey.
The Knights are hoping to push forward and host a regional — avoiding the trap of playing national powers Florida or Florida State in the tournament’s first round — and very much could do so.
UCF will start the year ranked No. 17 and will have plenty of opportunities to pad the resume — even this week when the team plays No. 5 Alabama on Friday at the UCF softball complex.
To help get set for the season, UCF softball radio voice Eric Lopez interviewed coach Renee Luers-Gillespie to preview the upcoming season for SportsTalk Florida and In The Circle:
The season opens up Thursday against Liberty, a little tamer of an opponent. But there are plenty of difficult opponents on UCF’s challenging schedule. This is a team that will test itself against the best and have a chance to make a name nationally.
This is a very very good UCF softball team. Very likely the best team in the entire cache of UCF sports. There certainly are high expectations.
Despite bringing back many of the same players from last year, there are still questions that need to be answered.
Eric Lopez, writing for In the Circle, previewed the season:
The question will be back who will pitch behind Turnier as the Knights dont have Mackenzie Audas who graduated as the Knights all-time leader in Wins, Strikeouts and No Hitters in a career. Audas finished behind Turnier in the NCAA with 0.95 ERA while going 24-1 and made Academic All-American Team. The combo of Turnier and Audas helped UCF finish No 1 in the country in ERA (0.93) as a staff.
The Knights bring back veteran seniors Jamie Ujvari and Mackenzie Huhn who have were part of the Knights 2014,2015 American Conference championships to the pitching staff while also adding Manami Calixto who comes to UCF after two successful seasons at Miami Dade College. The Curitiba, Brazil, native Calixto was named FCSAA Pitcher of the Year twice and earned NJCAA First Team All-America and Pitcher of the Year honors. Calixto was a member of the 2010 Brazil National World Cup Championship team.
There will be a lot of expectation on this team to repeat all the success of last year and do more. That is exactly how UCF wants it in the end.
Now the question is how do they get started and how do they follow up last year’s season?
The Knights will get that going Thursday.
[…] It has been a fight for respect for UCF. The Knights do not have a deep softball history — the Knights have been to the NCAA tournament the past two years, the first consecutive tournament appearances in program history — and are still hoping to get a hosting slot for the NCAA Softball Tournament Regionals, an issue made more complicated by the geography of powers Florida and Florida State in the area. […]