Indiana softball earns NCAA tournament bid for second straight season
BLOOMINGTON — The Indiana softball team received an NCAA tournament bid for the second straight year on Sunday night.
It's the first time the program has reached the postseason in consecutive seasons since 1985-86.
According to the ESPN Selection Show, Indiana was one of the final four teams in the 64-team field alongside Ole Miss, Penn State and UCF. The first four out were BYU, Louisville, Texas Tech and Wichita State.
The Hoosiers are part of the Columbia Regional at the University of Missouri along with the host school, Washington and Omaha.
Indiana (40-18) added to its résumé over the weekend by reaching the finals of the Big Ten tournament. The No. 8 seeded Hoosiers knocked out No. 1 seed Northwestern in the quarterfinals and pulled up a comeback win in extra-innings over Nebraska in the semifinals.
They lost in the finals 3-1 to No. 2 Michigan on Saturday.
In the NCAA tournament, Indiana will face Washington on Friday afternoon in the opening round. The Huskies went 31-13 and just secured their 30th consecutive regional appearance.
They are led by a trio of players (Rylee Holtorf, Brooke Nelson and Ruby Meylan) who were named first-team All-Pac 12. Nelson leads the team with a .350 batting average and 12 home runs while Holtorf hit .348 and had 11 home runs.
Meylan earned first-team honors for the second consecutive year as the team's ace. She had a 2.14 ERA in 27 appearances (19 starts) with 137 strikeouts. She was among the conference leaders in ERA, strikeouts and strikeouts per seven innings.
Missouri, the tournament's No. 7 overall seed, went 43-15 this season and lost in the SEC Tournament finals to Florida over the weekend. Omaha (41-13) was won the Summit League championship to earn its first-ever NCAA tournament bid.
They will play in the later game on Friday afternoon.
Michael Niziolek is the Indiana beat reporter for The Bloomington Herald-Times. You can follow him on X @michaelniziolek and read all his coverage by clicking here.
This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: Indiana softball reaches NCAA tournament for second straight year
