Big 12 Previews

Texas vs. Texas A&M Softball: Austin Super Regional Preview and Prediction

By Bryan Clinton

Posted on May 21, 2024

Share

Tweet

Share

Share

Email

The Austin Super Regional will get underway on Friday, May 24, as No. 1 Texas plays host to No. 16 Texas A&M in a future SEC showdown.

The Longhorns and Aggies will play a best-of-three series to determine which of them will punch their ticket to Oklahoma City for the 2024 Women’s College World Series. Here’s everything you need to know before the matchup.

HOW THEY GOT HERE

Texas Longhorns

Texas won the Big 12 regular season title for the first time since 2009 and made it to the Big 12 Tournament Championship but fell to Oklahoma 5-1. Still, with an incredibly dominant season and a 16-6 record against Top 25 teams (in RPI), the Longhorns secured the top overall seed in the NCAA Tournament. In the Austin Regional, the Longhorns took care of business against Siena (5-0) on Friday night before blasting Northwestern (14-2, F/5) on Saturday and then again on Sunday (7-0) to advance to the Super Regional round.

 

Texas A&M Aggies

Texas A&M battled through the SEC to finish third with a 15-9 record in league play. In the SEC Tournament, the Aggies took down South Carolina to get to the semifinals but fell there to the eventual tournament champions, Florida, 7-3. Still, a third-place finish in a league that sent all 13 teams to the NCAA Tournament is good enough for a national seed, although some would argue that being the lowest-seeded of eight SEC seeds was a slight. Nonetheless, the Aggies went 3-0 in the Bryan-College Station Regional, taking down Albany (6-2) on Friday and then Texas State (1-0) on Saturday and again on Sunday (8-0, F/5) to advance to the Supers.

TALE OF THE TAPE

 

SCHEDULE

RED & CHARLINE McCOMBS FIELD | AUSTIN, TEXAS | MAY 24-26  

• Friday, May 24
  • Game 1: (1) Texas vs. (16) Texas A&M | 5 p.m. | ESPN2
• Saturday, May 25
  • Game 2: (1) Texas vs. (16) Texas A&M | 4 p.m.
• Sunday, May 26
  • Game 3 if necessary: TBD

KEY MATCHUP

Emiley Kennedy vs. Texas Offense

Unquestionably one of the best pitchers in the SEC in 2024, Texas A&M’s Emiley Kennedy (1.57 ERA) will be the X-Factor in this series. Kennedy’s 187.0 IP more than doubles the Aggies’ second-most experienced arm (Shaylee Ackerman, 75.0 IP). Kennedy has pitched a total of 34.0 innings against Top 50 scoring offenses this season and maintains a 2.88 ERA and 1.24 K/BB ratio against those opponents. However, the Texas offense she will face is only similar to one offense she’s seen all year: Florida. In 10.1 IP against the Gators, Kennedy struggled: 10 H, 7 R, 6 ER, 12 BB, 8 K. That breaks out to a 4.17 ERA and a 0.67 K/BB ratio. She’ll have to be better than that against Texas if the Aggies are going to pull off the upset.

SERIES PREDICTION

Most people will look at this matchup and see the 1-seed and the 16-seed and assume that Texas will just walk right over the Aggies on their way to Oklahoma City. While there’s certainly a chance that could happen, I’d bet that the more likely outcome is that Texas A&M pushes the Longhorns in this series, but doesn’t have the juice to get it done in the end.

Kennedy and Ackerman are going to be the arms tasked with keeping Texas’ offense under wraps, and I’d bet in one of the first two games, they will do a decent job–for four innings or so. However, once the Longhorns’ rotation has seen them a few times, they’ll get things going and eventually pull away. Texas advances, but it takes two gutsy performances against a battle-tested Texas A&M squad.

Prediction: Texas wins the series, 2-0