Softball fans, it’s time to open your pocketbooks and head to your team’s NIL fund because the best player in college softball is now available as Stanford pitcher NiJaree Canady has officially entered the transfer portal.
The 2024 USA Softball Player of the Year immediately becomes the biggest target in the transfer portal—and perhaps the biggest name that we’ve seen enter the portal in the sport’s history.
Canady, a native of Topeka, Kansas, has led the Stanford Cardinal to the Women’s College World Series in each of the last two seasons, falling short of a Championship appearance after being defeated in the semifinal round in both years.
Over the course of the 2024 season, Canady led the country with a 0.73 ERA and 337 strikeouts in 230.2 IP. It was her second season in a row to lead all of softball in ERA, after posting a 0.57 mark in her freshman season.
In two seasons with the Cardinal, Canady went 41-10 as a starter with 365.2 IP and 34 complete games. In that time, she totaled an absurd 555 strikeouts to just 65 walks, with 35 earned runs and just 180 hits allowed.
It’s likely that we will see a bidding war of epic proportions in the battle to secure Canady’s services, with three programs seemingly out front in the race already.
Oklahoma, the four-time defending national champions, just lost the best senior class that softball has ever seen and is in need of an arm.
Texas returns all but three players from a 55-win team that fell short in the champ series last season and is likely already the favorite to win a title in 2025. Adding Canady would put them in the territory of “best teams ever.”
Then there’s Florida, the third team rumored to be in the fight. The Gators nearly beat Oklahoma twice in the National Semifinals and return the vast majority of their production, including freshman star pitcher Keagan Rothrock. Adding Canady to that rotation would give the Gators an unimaginable 1-2 punch that would make them the favorites to win it all in ’25.
