How loaded Texas Tech fell short again in the WCWS: ‘You can’t buy a championship’
How loaded Texas Tech fell short again in the WCWS: 'You can't buy a championship'
Stewart Mandel
Fri, June 5, 2026 at 5:16 AM CDT6 min read
OKLAHOMA CITY — Minutes before Texas Tech and Texas touched off the Women's College World Series finals Wednesday, Red Raiders coach Gerry Glasco told ESPN's Holly Rowe, "Everything we've built in the last year-and-a half has been for this moment, and I believe we're ready."
Barely 24 hours later, with Tech down 1-0 in the series but clinging to a 1-0 lead in the top of the fifth, shortstop Hailey Toney fielded a sharp grounder to her right, pivoted to make the easy throw to third base to get out of the inning — and missed wildly. Two runners scored, ruining Tech ace Nijaree Canady's shutout.
Two innings later, after falling behind 3-1, two Texas Tech fielders let an easy foul ball down the third base line drop between them. Three batters after that, right fielder Lauren Allred couldn't glove an incoming line drive, resulting in another run to make it 4-1. Even her relay throw to second base was bobbled.
A year ago, Tech was a Cinderella that made it all the way to the final night of the season before succumbing to Texas. This time, Glasco's loaded group of all-star transfers was the preseason No. 1 team and yet missed out on a national championship to Texas again, this time one night short of the final night of the season.
The 2026 Red Raiders — which may have been the most expensive non-revenue team of the NIL era — were not ready.
"Anyone that understands our sport knows that you can't buy a championship," said the coach who so many softball fans have accused of trying to buy a championship.
Kentucky men's basketball, Texas football and a bunch of other big-spending non-champions in other sports would concur with Glasco.
Texas Tech became the villains of its sport for attempting to elevate the previously forlorn program the way so many football and basketball programs have rebuilt theirs: By shelling out dollars to upgrade their rosters. No one knows exactly how much Texas Tech spent, just that it's well more than anyone else. In a sport where a small handful of players make even $100,000, the Red Raiders had a lineup full of players making well north of that, led by seven-figure pitcher Canady.
It wasn't just the dollar figures that irked folks; it was the alleged tampering. The softball establishment was so offended by their tactics — Tennessee coach Karen Weekly told The Athletic last month that ex-Lady Vol Taylor Pannell signed a deal with Tech during last season — that Power 4 teams refused to play them in non-conference games.
While all that controversy was great for the TV ratings — not to mention sportswriters — it put an enormous target on Texas Tech players' backs. Their entire NCAA tournament run was an adventure, from having to rally from down 8-0 in the seventh inning against Ole Miss in the Regionals to a 10-2 loss at Florida in the Super Regionals (and Florida's pitchers plunking ex-Gator Mia Williams five times in three games) to an extra-inning loss to Tennessee in their second WCWS game, followed by an extra-inning win against UCLA the next night.
They snapped out of it in time to sweep a two-game semifinal against No. 1 seed Alabama, capped by a vintage Canady complete-game shutout, but still, Tech's lineup of four .400-plus hitters, eight players with double-digit home runs and two All-American pitchers, felt a bit ... off, this entire postseason.
It may be that no one would have gotten hits off Texas's history-making pitcher, Teagan Kavan, in this series. But as the wheels came off late in Game 2, with Canady allowing a seventh-inning home run to Texas's Kayden Henry, followed by all those fielding miscues, one wondered whether the burden of being the bad guys finally did them in.
"I don't know if (we were) rattled or we just (weren't) prepared for the pressure," said Glasco, "but there were plays we should make that we didn't."
Glasco and his players insisted that finishing as the national runner-up again does not qualify as a disappointment. ("Only if you're naive and don't understand the difficulty of the sport ... did you think this is disappointing," said Glasco.) His biggest regret, though, was not being able to win a national championship for Canady.
The two-time National Pitcher of the Year, winning in 2024 at Stanford and '25 at Texas Tech, elevated not just two programs, but also her entire sport — through her blistering rise balls and trademark "NiJa Stomp" after big strikeouts. But even she seemed off for much of her final college season.
Canady, who sat out Tech's fall practices/scrimmages to recover from last year's heavy load, had ridiculous ERAs of 0.57, 0.65 and 1.11 her first three seasons. That number rose to 1.87 as a senior, hurt by a turbulent postseason in which she allowed 10 home runs in 12 NCAA tournament appearances. Last year, she allowed 13 the entire season.
"I feel like this whole year has been hard," she said after Thursday's game. "Me and (pitching coach) Tara (Archibald) were kind of looking at the stats of other pitchers, and it was an offensive-heavy year. I think that contributed a lot to it."
But that didn't seem to affect her Texas nemesis, Kavan, who became the first repeat WCWS Most Outstanding Player by allowing just four earned runs in 26.1 innings.
Canady, who last month became the No. 2 pick in the AUSL draft, will still leave a massive legacy in her wake, even if her four WCWS trips ended without a trophy. "I don't think someone's whole career is defined by a National Championship," she said.
Much like in football, the end of the season runs up against the start of the transfer portal. It officially opens Monday, but several standouts across the country have already announced they're entering. The buzz in the Devon Park press box this week was that there's about to be a whole lot more.
Texas Tech is no longer the only softball school opening its wallet.
The Red Raiders themselves return most of their lineup in 2027, but many assume they'll go all in again to find a replacement for Canady. The question is, will their billionaire benefactors be so quick to write checks this time after coming up short again.
Glasco seemed to indicate ... yes.
"Our investors are beyond thrilled with where we're at," he said after Thursday's loss. "The families and the businesses that are supporting (us), they're elated ... they couldn't (have) imagined what we did happening 24 months ago."
Perhaps those investors aren't ready to stop chasing a championship just yet.
If only they could guarantee a return.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
