alt=Jay DrewSlugger Huntyr Ava is the optimist on the BYU softball team, always cheerful and looking on the bright side of things.
But even Ava, a fifth-year senior from Salt Lake City’s West High, is being realistic as the Cougars prepare for their first Big 12 softball tournament, which begins Wednesday and runs through Saturday in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
“We will probably have to beat the three best teams in the league to win it,” she said.
Make that three of the best four teams in the country — if the USA Today/NFCA Division I poll is accurate.
BYU, which swept Kansas last week in Lawrence to earn the No. 6 seed in the tournament, will face No. 3 seed Oklahoma State at 10 a.m. MDT Thursday in its tournament opener.
If the Cougars (30-22) somehow knock off OSU (44-9), which is ranked No. 3 in the country, they will likely see No. 4-ranked Oklahoma on Friday. The defending national champion Sooners (46-6) get the winner of Wednesday’s Houston-Kansas game on Thursday.
On the other side of the bracket is No. 1-ranked Texas (45-6).
And you thought the Big 12 men’s basketball tournament was stacked.
“Winning the tournament would honestly be the best accomplishment ever for our program,” Ava said. “But the only way we can do that is win our first game and go from there.”
That won’t be easy, by any stretch.
Oklahoma State just took two of three from Oklahoma last week in Norman, and has won 10 of its last 11 games. BYU upset OSU 11-8 in Provo on March 22, but the Cowgirls won the other two games at Miller Park by scores of 3-2 and 10-2.
So Ava is saying there’s a chance.
“We are pretty stoked about how we are playing,” she said. “I feel like we are all clicking at the right time — our bats, our pitching, even our defense. I feel like we are all bought in after the sweep of Kansas. … With the kind of lineup we have, anything is possible.”
Pitching has been an issue for the Cougars all season, as a couple of their best arms were injured and unable to complete the season. Led by Ava, who has belted a team-high 12 home runs, the Cougars have one of the more prolific offenses in the Big 12.
Violet Zavodnik has hit 11 homers, while Ailana Agbayani leads the squad in hitting with a .434 average.
“We are very competitive, and we never give up,” Ava said. “We obviously went through our ups and downs, but I feel like we never gave up. Even at the end of the season, we never stopped competing because we are a proud BYU program with a history of success.”
Coach Gordon Eakin said on April 8 that resiliency has been BYU’s calling card in its first season in the Big 12 after it grew accustomed to dominating the West Coast Conference in previous seasons and making annual appearances in the NCAA Tournament.
“We have fought tooth and nail in every game just to give ourselves a chance to win,” Eakin said.
To make it back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2021, BYU might have to win the tournament and claim the league’s automatic berth. BYU’s RPI is at 51 right now, and historically teams with RPIs in the low 40s are picked on Selection Sunday.
Of course, a couple wins over teams with top-10 RPIs would be extremely helpful to BYU’s cause. Oklahoma State is No. 8, Oklahoma is No. 2 and Texas is No. 1 in the RPI.
The Cougars stunned OU 9-4 on April 12 at Love’s Field in Norman, so anything is possible, Ava believes.
“The Big 12 was definitely more challenging (than the WCC), but I wouldn’t say it was harder. It was just tougher and more competitive,” she said. “We weren’t able to let down at any one time, or relax on anything. We had to fight on every pitch and know that the game can change on just one hit.”
Ava graduated with a degree in family life last month. After spending the last five seasons in Provo and belting 63 home runs, she would love to play professionally somewhere when the Cougars’ run ends this month.
She’s proud to have made her mark on BYU’s records books, having grown up a fan of the University of Utah. She said the Utes offered her a scholarship after she was the 2019 Deseret News’ Ms. Softball, but she “chose the Y,” and not just because that’s a letter in her first name.
“Honestly, it wasn’t the easiest transition because all of our clothes and even our canopies were all Ute stuff. I don’t know why we were big Utah fans. Maybe because it was the school up the street so we cheered them on.
“We had to, little by little, get rid of the red stuff,” she continued. “The transition was probably harder on my dad, honestly, because he is the one that stuck us into softball, but it obviously blessed us in the long run.”
And what about that Y in her name? How did it get there?
“My mom honestly wanted a boy and she fell in love with the name Hunter,” Ava said. “But when the doctors told her it was going to be a girl she thought she could change the ‘E’ to a ‘Y’ to make it more feminine.”
Whatever the case, it works. Just like Ava and the BYU softball team.
Cougars on the air
Big 12 softball tournament
- No. 6 BYU (11-16, 30-22) vs. No. 3 Oklahoma State (21-6, 44-9)
- Thursday, 10 a.m. MDT
- OE Energy Field at Devon Park, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
- TV: Big 12 Now on ESPN+