To start its season, No. 8/5 Texas softball will pack its bags and hit the road to play some of the best teams in the country. 

The Longhorns will travel to Los Angeles, California to play San Diego and No. 10/8 UCLA in the Stacy Winsberg Tournament Friday. On Saturday, Texas will face the same teams before playing Loyola Marymount on Sunday. 

Texas’ season begins Friday, Feb. 9 though it won’t play a home game until Feb. 21, but the team is excited to start playing other teams and see a change of scenery. 

“Playing mostly on the road this season will be good for us,” senior infielder Alyssa Washington said. “We’ve been in a bubble all year practicing at our field, playing each other, inter-squad (scrimmages) constantly.” 

Not only will the Longhorns face new competition early, but some of the best teams in the country. After they come home from California, Texas will travel to the clear opposite side of the country to play in the Shriners Children’s Clearwater Invitational in Florida. 

In Clearwater, Texas will face more top teams, including No. 2/2 Tennessee, No. 3/3 Stanford, North Carolina, No. 25/RV Kentucky and No. 20/25 Northwestern. 

While most of the team is returning and understands the effects of travel, one-third of the team is new. Head coach Mike White said that the road games may be difficult, but the key is for his team to react in the right way.

“There’s going to be a learning curve there and we know that but hopefully, we just don’t get too bent out of shape,” White said. “We’ve got to react to what happens and in the right way. We could go out there like we did a few years ago and we had a little bit of a losing streak. … We know that the competition we’re playing right now is very difficult and we’ve got to be able to handle that if it happens.” 

The expectation for Texas softball is to get back to Oklahoma City for the College Softball World Series and it starts with playing tough opponents at the beginning of the season. Traveling early in the season will allow the team to solidify its chemistry that senior left-handed pitcher Estelle Czech said is already strong.

“Our chemistry has always been really (strong), but the coaches did a good job of doing a lot of team bonding this year and getting us very close-knit really soon,” Czech said. 

Playing some of the best teams in the country early in the season will give Texas the chance to solidify itself as one of the top contenders for the World Series Championship, getting it back to where it was two years ago.