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These Gators Cleaning Up With 56-2 Mark
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Published: May 2, 2008
GAINESVILLE - It was another fun afternoon for the best-kept secret juggernaut in college sports. Practice was done for the University of Florida softball team. Now it was time to tidy up. Players raked dirt, swept the dugout, picked up trash and collected the home-run balls they'd knocked over the fence. They left their stadium just as they'd found it.
"That's how we do things," Florida catcher Kristina Hilberth said.
And now this:
56-2.
That's the won-loss record for the Florida softball team.
56-2.
That's also how they do things.
Meet the team with the most wins, and best winning percentage, in college softball. Meet the steamroller. We don't know which is more impressive, the 56 or the 2. It's a record that would make the Harlem Globetrotters drool.
But to a woman, or man (third-year coach Tim Walton), there is work to do. The Gators, ranked second in the nation, travel to Knoxville this weekend for a three-game series with Tennessee. If Florida wins twice, it will be SEC co-champion. If it wins three times, it grabs the title by itself, which brings us to the Gators' ponytailed All-American pitcher and all-world free spirit, Stacey Nelson. Co-champions?
"Co- is a no-no," Nelson said.
Meet the gators. These Gators.
You'll like them.
1 Goal: College World Series
Yes, they have a slate nearly as clean as their stadium, and one goal fixed in their heads: the College World Series in Oklahoma City. It would be the first in the life of this 12-year-old program.
"If we weren't in Oklahoma in June, it would be a disappointment," Nelson said.
They still can't wrap their minds around 56-2. Florida's best season before this was last season, when it won 50 games for the first time, then came within one win, one run, of advancing to the World Series. Note: Florida still lost 22 games last season.
Now it has lost two.
"If you told us we'd be 56-2, it would have been hard to imagine," said Hilberth, a junior from Dunedin.
These Gators can beat you any way you like, or don't like. They'll outpitch you, or outhit you, or outrun you, or outbunt you. First baseman Ali Gardiner is hitting .400 (.455 in the SEC) with a team-high 49 RBIs. And there's Francesca Enea (13 homers, 48 RBIs), Megan Bush (10 homers) and Mary Ratliff (39 RBIs). Ratliff is the team's lone senior - 56-2 and one senior. Think about that. While you do, we'll chat up Stacey.
Stacey Nelson plops down in a chair. She has just finished her last term paper of the spring semester of her junior year, 15 pages of moral philosophy from the philosophy major. A synopsis:
"It was that we don't have moral requirements, but there are instances when we are bound to act and non-action is not always morally indifferent. I made up the word non-action. I like making up words." Teammates can't always find words to describe their heart and soul, whether the fun-loving California native and energy source is on or off the mound. Nelson throws her ponytail over her left shoulder before her right arm goes to work. This season, she has a school-record 35 wins and 14 shutouts, an 0.70 ERA and 270 strikeouts.
Nelson loves talking about her teammates. She also dreams of joining the Peace Corps, going to Africa and teaching children. In other words, she'd like to save the half of the world she isn't striking out. Oh, and Stacey has her fun.
Gators baseball player Matt LaPorta, Florida's all-time homer hitter, once smiled and told Nelson he'd hit one of her pitches 500 feet. "But he never stepped up to the plate, literally," Nelson said with a grin. She figures she'd make him look sick with one of her curves. And Tim Tebow? Nelson is a monster football fan, but nearly laughs, in good fun, when thinking about Timmy T. in front of her with a bat.
"Pffffff. Are you kidding? No chance," Nelson said.
Meet the Gators. These Gators.
Even Coach Was Caught Off Guard
Tim Walton came from Wichita State three years ago with the idea of building a big-name softball program. He actually thought this team would hit its stride next season, when Nelson was a senior. So 56-2 caught him off guard, too.
"It breeds confidence," Walton said. "You're 56-2. 56-2. I don't care what sport you're playing. I don't care if you're a girl, a guy, a little kid. It gives you confidence."
So does a little attention. When Walton's players were introduced during a men's basketball game, fans stood and cheered, really cheered.
"We were like, 'People know who we are,'" Ali Gardiner said.
They were the ones with trash bags last month at the softball facility. You see, Walton, who's no screamer, nevertheless came out one day and found a cup in the parking lot near the locker room. The next afternoon, he handed out trash bags.
"I told them if you don't have enough pride to throw that cup in the trash, we don't have a program," he said.
So off they went.
"They did a nice job," Walton said.
Funny, they're still cleaning up.
56-2.
"... I don't really think about it," the philosopher Stacey Nelson said. "But you know, now that I do ... wow."
Wow is in.
And co- is a no-no.
That's the Gators. These Gators.
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