OKLAHOMA CITY – Mississippi State softball players filed into the press conference room at Devon Field in Oklahoma City on Friday night, eyes red and faces splotched. Their season had just come to an end.
Senior pitcher Peja Goold, who sat on the far right of the stage, reached behind and grabbed a box of tissues. She pulled a few from the box, and passed it down the line to the rest of her teammates on the platform, preparing for the possibility of flowing tears as they powered through the media’s questions.
Senior Nadia Barbary walked in later than the rest of the pack along with head coach Samantha Ricketts. Barbary appeared to be taking the loss worse than anyone on the stage. She had put on the MSU jersey for the final time after four years in Starkville.
“Give the box (of tissues) to Nadia,” senior Kiarra Sells said softly, but loud enough to be picked up by the microphone in front of her.
Barbary took the box from sophomore Xiane Romero, hugged it tight against her stomach, and like a magician with a colorful ribbon, pulled out an endless bunch of tissues.
When the first question of the conference came, asking the players what they would remember from playing for this year’s team, everyone on stage turned their heads to Barbary.
“Everything,” Barbary said, her voice shaky. “The bus rides, plane rides, waking up at 5 a.m. to go lift. Everything.”
After her response, Barbary looked down the line of her teammates, searching for someone else to take over the floor.
“We literally did the unthinkable, we were making history our whole season,” senior Morgan Bernardini said after stepping in. “Yes this sucks right now, but what better way to end it?”
Bernardini was right. The early exit in the program’s first ever Women’s College World Series was a sour end to a season that was truly “unthinkable.”
The Bulldogs were picked 11th out of 15 by SEC coaches in the conference’s preseason softball rankings, and had no players listed on the All-SEC preseason team. But assistant coach Taryne Mowatt-McKinney told Ricketts in October that if Bulldog pitching continued to progress the way it was, State would be on their way to the WCWS.
“We may have looked at her like she might have been a little crazy,” Ricketts said with a laugh, admitting some doubt that a season ending in Oklahoma City was possible for her squad.
It looked like Mowatt-McKinney was onto something early in the year. The Bulldogs entered conference play 26-2 and No. 12 in the country. But as SEC play rolled, State hit a wall.
Offensive struggles and a tough conference slate resulted in a 43-21 regular season record, 9-15 in conference play. State was the 10 seed in the 15-team conference tournament, and was bounced in the second round in a 3-0 loss against Arkansas.
Then something clicked.
The Bulldogs rolled through the Eugene Regional to advance to MSU’s second-ever Super Regional and then did the impossible, taking down one of softball’s biggest programs in Oklahoma.
The Bulldogs rallied from down four runs in Game 1 against the Sooners for an 11-9 victory. MSU shutout Oklahoma, the first team to do so since 2019, with its back against the wall in Game 3, advancing to the program’s first-ever WCWS.
Yes, the two shutout losses in OKC hurt, but it is a temporary sting in the permanent effect of MSU’s improbable run to the sport’s biggest stage.
Ricketts said that this year’s team, especially the veterans, raised the standards for MSU softball.
“I’m just so thankful for them and what they’ve done for us,” Ricketts said of her seniors, some of whom sat directly to her right on stage. “We’re going to continue to build off the foundation they set…”
MSU also leaves OKC with something it didn’t have before: the ability to say it’s played in the WCWS.
After their time on the stage was up, MSU’s five player representatives stood up, pushed their chairs in and walked off. Even through the tears and tough questions, they left the room standing tall, heads held high.
MSU’s 2026 team had left the softball spotlight for the final time. Its impact on the players and the program, however, is going to be felt for years to come.
Jake is the Mississippi State athletics reporter for The Dispatch.
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