Forty Acres Insider: May 7 - University of Texas Athletics

Chris Del Conte head shot

Longhorn Nation,

ALL WE DO IS WIN, WIN, WIN, NO MATTER WHAT! The Tower's been beaming all year as a glorious bright orange beacon of our success, and we light it this time for our outright Big 12 Championship Softball squad that put the final emphatic touches on their historic title run in Lubbock last weekend. That makes it an oh-so-sweet dozen conference crowns we've claimed this year, just one short of our Big 12 record and the seventh time in conference history we've won a dozen or more in a year (oh and humblebrag here for y'all to share, no other Big 12 school has EVER done that!). Take it a step further and our 12 titles this year are three times as many as any school (Oklahoma State is second with four), and the dozen conference championships matches the total of all 13 other schools combined (how 'bout them apples?!). And we're not done yet! Our all-time Big 12 record of 13 titles in a year is in our sights as Softball takes its No. 1 seed to the Big 12 Tourney this week in Oklahoma City, while two more league crowns are on the line as Outdoor Track and Field heads to Waco. Plus, we've still got Rowing and Baseball in the mix and ready to compete to raise those trophies!

what a weekend 🤘#HookEm pic.twitter.com/xEpcIDusSc
— Texas Softball (@TexasSoftball) May 6, 2024

Your Longhorns were stampeding on the national scene right here in the ATX last week, as well. Some challenging weather patterns couldn't dampen our spirit or contain their Texas Fight as No. 3 Men's and No. 9 Women's Tennis took down all challengers, both moving on to the NCAA CHAMPIONSHIPS SWEET 16 with a pair of wins each. For the men, it was straight-up sweeps on Friday and Saturday to move on to the Round of 16 for the 10th consecutive year. After an opening-round sweep Saturday, our women endured a two-and-a-half rain delay before pulling off a gritty 4-3 victory over Georgia Tech on Sunday. It's our women's fourth-straight trip (and six of the last eight) to the Sweet 16. And how about this for a testament to our elite programs – that makes us just one of two schools nationally (Virginia is the other) to have the men's and women's teams make the Round of 16 in each of the last four years. Their road to the National Championship continues on Friday with the men hosting our longtime rival No. 17 Texas A&M at our very own Texas Tennis Center (6 p.m. CT), and the women traveling to Los Angeles to face No. 8 UCLA (2 p.m. CT/Noon PT). Stay tuned for all the details on those matches and be ready to get those Horns Up!

Texas is one of just 5 programs that has both its Men's AND Women's Tennis teams in this year's NCAA Championship Sweet 16🤘🏻

It's the 4th straight year that both @TexasMTN & @TexasWTN have made the Round of 16, joining Virginia as the only 2 programs to do that the last 4 years. pic.twitter.com/GbbOCi1TvU
— John Bianco (@UT_Bianco) May 6, 2024

There's so much to talk about, but before we get too far along in this week's Forty Acres Insider, this is an extra special time, as it's GRADUATION WEEK! It's a monumental week that is so important for our student-athletes, their families, and all of us, as we celebrate their great accomplishment! When they walk across that stage and receive their diplomas (with the Home of the Horns — the iconic, magnificent, and majestic Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium as a backdrop for the campus-wide ceremony to boot!), it will be the culmination of a lot of hard work, sacrifice, determination, and commitment to reach the ultimate goal of every student-athlete. We are so very proud of each and every one of them and look forward to our annual graduation celebration and the presentation of the student-athlete commencement stoles on Thursday. WHAT STARTS HERE, CHANGES THE WORLD, my friends, and we've got more than 100 current and former student-athletes participating in commencement this weekend receiving an incredible degree that will help them do just that! As is tradition, President Hartzell will be Lighting the Tower on Saturday night in honor of the Class of 2024 for their tremendous accomplishment!

With grand success on our minds, let's revisit Softball and how they LIT THE TOWER ORANGE in putting an exclamation mark on a phenomenal Big 12 Regular Season Championship in Lubbock last weekend. That's our first softball conference crown since 2010, and to add icing to the cake, it snaps the 11-year stronghold our Red River Rivals had on the trophy. Our Horns left no doubt in wrestling that trophy from the Sooners, outscoring Texas Tech 50-7 in three-straight mercy rule outings to end the regular season. We run-ruled the Red Raiders, 13-3, Friday then smashed six homers (the second-most in a game in school history!) en route to matching a school-record 23 runs in a shut out on Saturday. Sunday was wash, rinse, repeat, as we sealed the deal on the Big 12 Title with a 14-4 win. We're stampeding into the Big 12 Tourney, indeed, riding a 16-game winning streak and a 45-6 (25-4, Big 12) record. Reese Atwood continues to be en fuego at the plate, going yard for a school-record 21st time on Sunday (she's had four round-trippers in the last two games!), one day after setting our Longhorn single-game record for RBIs in a game with nine on Saturday! Like our entire team, we're heading into postseason on a heater!! Rest assured, we know Coach White and the team's mantra, and THE JOB AIN'T DONE YET! Next up it's Oklahoma City and USA Softball Hall of Fame Stadium this week with our squad laser-focused on a tourney title to bookend our regular-season crown. We get a well-earned bye in round one, then take on the winner of Wednesday's Iowa State and Texas Tech matchup on Thursday (5 p.m. CT/ESPN+).

for the first time since 2010, YOUR BIG 12 REGULAR SEASON CHAMPIONS 🏆🤘#HookEm pic.twitter.com/ci4cMWBhBM
— Texas Softball (@TexasSoftball) May 5, 2024

Big 12 Championships will be on the line for Track and Field this week as they head up I-35 to Waco for the conference meet on Thursday-Saturday at Clyde Hart Track & Field Stadium with sights set high for our men's and women's squads that are both ranked in the top-10 nationally. The women will be looking for one for the thumb, as they seek to close out our time in the Big 12 by securing the championship trophy for a fifth-straight time. The men are focused on reclaiming the title they won in back-to-back years in 2021-22, before finishing as runners-up last year. It's gonna be a heck of a few days of competition, and here's to lots of Longhorn titles, points aplenty and a big-time exclamation point on our Big 12 era of track and field!

It's that time of year when our Golf programs are in the stretch run and TAKING DEAD AIM on the Natty! No. 10 Women's Golf is underway as we speak at their NCAA Regional in Winston-Salem (Monday-Wednesday) as the No. 2 seed seeking a top-five finish to advance to the NCAA Championship (May 17-22 in Carlsbad, Calif.). For our No. 13-ranked men's squad, their NCAA postseason journey commences this coming Monday through Wednesday (May 13-15) at the NCAA Austin Regional in our own backyard at the UT Golf Club. Your Big 12 Champion Longhorns earned the No. 3 seed at that regional site and will look for a top-five finish in order to advance to the NCAA Championship from May 24-29 at Omni La Costa in Carlsbad, Calif.

AUSTIN REGIONAL BOUND 🤘#HookEm pic.twitter.com/yXWngtCSE0
— Texas Men's Golf (@TexasMGolf) May 1, 2024

And well looky here, folks, Baseball is right in the thick of the Big 12 race on the heels of winning a conference series for the fourth-straight time and seventh time in eight outings this year. This time we took two-of-three from No. 14 Oklahoma State at UFCU Disch-Falk Field to move into a tie for second place in the league standings. Big plays, clutch hits, sensational pitching, and of course, the long ball led us to victory in a couple of nailbiters against the Cowboys on Friday (7-5) and Saturday (6-3). Sunday's loss snapped a five-game winning streak, but with the pair of wins over the weekend, we've won eight of the last 10 and are 30-19 overall (15-9, Big 12) on the season. Now we're rounding the curve and heading for home with just two more weekend series (at UCF on Friday-Sunday & vs. Kansas at UFCU Disch-Falk Field, May 16-18) before we roll into the postseason. Here's to making that FINAL BIG 12 REGULAR SEASON BASEBALL SERIES at The Disch in a couple of weeks a very, very special one!

So, folks, we're strollin' through May with our eyes on the prizes. It's Cap and Gown time, Championship Season, and just a FANTASTIC TIME TO BE A LONGHORN! Let's get those Horns Up and Hook 'Em!

No. 1 Softball lights the Tower with dominant weekend

Well folks, there's nothing better than leaving the Big 12 Conference with ANOTHER championship trophy! Courtesy of a three-game domination of the Red Raiders in Lubbock over the weekend, Coach White and our ladies claimed the league's 2024 regular season championship and the program's first outright regular-season title since 2010! The action got started with an impressive 13-3 win on Friday, then added a program-tying 23-run margin of victory (23-0) on Saturday, and concluded with an emphatic 14-4 win on Sunday to hoist the trophy. If you're going to clinch a conference title, there's no better way to do it than with THREE five-inning run-rule road wins! What. A. Feat. And speaking of feats, we must salute Reese Atwood who set the school's single-season home run record during Saturday's game and now owns the season marks for both homers and RBI! Now our attention shifts to earning a second Big 12 Championship. We enter the 2024 Phillips 66 Big 12 Softball Championship in Oklahoma City as the number ONE seed and will begin play on Thursday (5 p.m. CT/ESPN+) against the winner of Wednesday's No. 8 seed Texas Tech vs. No. 9 Iowa State contest. Should we advance, we'll play in the semifinals on Friday (7:30 p.m. CT/ESPN+) and the championship game on Saturday (6:30 p.m. CT/ESPN2). We're riding a 16-game winning streak with run-rule victories in five-straight games, and we'll look to keep the momentum going in the postseason!

guess championships do run through Lubbock 🤘#HookEm pic.twitter.com/fy8kI7Kury
— Texas Softball (@TexasSoftball) May 5, 2024

Baseball continues to make late-season push

Coach Pierce and our Baseball squad picked up its fourth-straight series win last weekend, taking two-of-three from then-No. 14 Oklahoma State at UFCU Disch-Falk Field. Longhorn Nation, you were simply outstanding all weekend long supporting the Horns! In Friday night's opener, our guys fell behind 4-1 in the third inning but showed tremendous Texas Fight. Every time the Cowboys would score, we answered right back immediately and pulled out a 7-5 victory. A tip-of-the-cap to our big-time reliever Gage Boehm, who pitched the final 2.2 innings and struck out four while earning the win. In Saturday's game two, we were tied at 3-3 before Max Belyeu came through with a clutch two-run homer in the eighth inning to pave the way for a 6-3 win. Now we turn the page and enter the final two weeks of league play, starting with a trip to Orlando this weekend to face UCF. We'll be in action on Friday (5 p.m. CT/ESPN+), Saturday (5 p.m. CT/ESPN+) and Sunday (12 p.m. CT/ESPN+). And make your plans now to attend the final Big 12 Baseball series at UFCU Disch-Falk Field the following weekend against Kansas (May 16-18).

Series secured.#HookEm | @andreduplantier pic.twitter.com/lHxPVK89L6
— Texas Baseball (@TexasBaseball) May 4, 2024

Sweet success in Tennis

How sweet it is to have both our tennis programs back in the Sweet 16, and what a weekend we had hosting the NCAA First and Second Rounds! Although the weather didn't do us any favors over the three days, and much of the tournament ended up being played indoors, our teams were as resilient as ever and both earned two wins to lock in their place in the Round of 16. Like I said in the open, our programs under Coach Berque and Coach Joffe have really cemented their place among the nation's elite and bring it each and every year, becoming one of just two schools along with Virginia to have the men and women BOTH get to the Sweet 16 the last four years, just awesome!

Coach Berque and the Men got us started on Friday with a 4-0 sweep over Sacramento State as all three matches on the men's side ended up being played at our Weller indoor courts. In the other Friday match, UCLA emerged over LSU to set up Saturday's second-round match with our Horns. That one had one heck of a doubles point with our guys coming up clutch in a tiebreaker of the third match to win, and then they went to work on the singles courts for another 4-0 sweep over a top-25 Bruins team. Now our second-seeded squad is on to hosting a Super Regional with none other than 15 seed Texas A&M coming to the Texas Tennis Center on Friday (6 p.m. CT) for the right to move on the championship site, which is up the road north in Stillwater this year.

Coach Joffe and our ninth-seeded Women will also be looking to get to Stillwater as they head out to Los Angeles for a rematch with eighth-seeded UCLA on Friday (2 p.m. CT/12 p.m. PT). Some of you might remember that's right where they opened the season. They came up on the short end of that match, but they were battling a food illness that forced them to forfeit two singles matches right off the bat, and we're making sure whatever they had won't be on the menu this time! They got to LA after winning our regional, starting with a 4-0 sweep of Harvard on Saturday that moved indoors just a few games into the doubles point. Georgia Tech topped Illinois in the other match, which did get to be played outside, along with our Sunday match (not without its challenges). In that one, the Yellow Jackets brought their A game, but our ladies rose to the occasion, winning another exciting doubles point in the last match, and then with the score knotted at 3-3, Vivian Ovrootsky came through will all eyes on her in the deciding singles match for the 4-3 victory!

And folks, I want to stop for a second right here and mention the yeoman's work that our staff put in to host this past weekend. Sometimes tournaments can go according to plan, but this time, Mother Nature was definitely trying to test our limits the whole way through with not just the bad weather, but mixing in just enough good weather to keep up the uncertainty. With our indoor courts being off campus, it's no small job every time the decision is made to change locations, but our dedicated group was up to the task multiple times. And just when we thought we might get through the final women's match unscathed, the skies opened up and dumped a swimming pool's worth of water on the courts in about 10 minutes. But coming out of that, what an awesome thing our men's team did. After just securing their Sweet 16 bid the day before, they took it on themselves to join our staff in grabbing squeegees and rollers to help get those courts dry and the teams back out there as soon as possible! Not only that, but they were there the entire time screaming their lungs out to help our ladies get over the finish line against Georgia Tech. It just makes you so proud to see.

Another thing that makes you proud is hard work rewarded, as the Big 12 yearly awards were announced last Thursday. Just like their matches, our men's squad made a clean sweep of them, with Eliot Spizzirri becoming our first ever back-to-back Big 12 men's player of the year, Gilles-Arnaud Bailly was our third freshman of the year in the last four seasons, Jonah Braswell was just our second Big 12 newcomer of the year, and then our guy Bruce, Coach Berque, picked up his third coach of the year award! We then had numerous All-Big 12 first and second-team selections and individual champions for both the men and women. Malaika Rapolu led the way for the women, being named first team in both singles and doubles, and our ladies topped the league in total individual champions. So, way to go to all of you, and let's keep it rolling all the way to Stillwater!

What a week for our former Track & Field stars!

The 2024 Paris Olympics are right around the corner and Texas Exes lit up the track at the World Relay Championships in the Bahamas this weekend. Fresh off her NCAA title here last season, Rhasidat Adeleke helped Ireland qualify for the Olympics in both the women's 4x400 relay and the mixed 4x400 relay, setting two Irish National Records. And check this out - in the mixed 4x400 relay final, Adeleke split 48.45. That. Is. FAST! Willington Wright also helped Team USA win the mixed 4x400 relay with a championship-record time of 3:10.73. Jonathan Jones also competed for Barbados and helped the 4x400 relay finish in 14th place with a season-best time of 3:03.72.

Third race lucky 🍀 🔥

U.S.-based Irishwoman Rhasidat Adeleke splits a RIDICULOUS 48.45 leg to bring her team to a podium finish in the mixed 4x400m relay at World Relays with a 3rd place 3:11.53 finish.

Adeleke's weekend:
49.64
49.48
48.45 pic.twitter.com/IZCywE0pti
— CITIUS MAG (@CitiusMag) May 6, 2024

Hook 'Em Horns,

Chris Del Conte

P.S. — No place like it, INDEED!

There's no place like it 🤘 pic.twitter.com/utwRAlmjj2
— Texas Football (@TexasFootball) May 4, 2024

P.S. — Make it a dozen and the chase to the record begins!

.@TexasSoftball's title makes it 1️⃣2️⃣ Big 12 Championships🏆 this year. That's the 7️⃣th time & 2nd year in-a-row we've won at least a DOZEN in a year, something no other B12 school has EVER done! And we're well on our way to breaking our all-time record of 13 ('05-06 & '20-21)🤘🏻 pic.twitter.com/EUl6X6OItk
— John Bianco (@UT_Bianco) May 5, 2024

P.S. — I'm here to report it made it home safely and ain't it a beauty!

bringing some hardware back to ATX 🏆🤘#HookEm pic.twitter.com/MAjCOaBBA1
— Texas Softball (@TexasSoftball) May 5, 2024

P.S. — So cool for our guy Coach Vic!

thanks @astros for having us out last night 🤘#HookEm pic.twitter.com/2dmJ9fgMYp
— Texas Women's Basketball (@TexasWBB) May 3, 2024

P.S. — Longhorns Family for Life! Congrats to Byron, his family and all of our NFL Draft Picks!!

Family first. 🤞 pic.twitter.com/SVBwBWDkcz
— Seattle Seahawks (@Seahawks) May 2, 2024

P.S. — This is a must watch on our guy Jonathon Brooks!

Hometown Hero.

Go inside Draft day with Jonathon Brooks 🤘@2brookss x @Panthers pic.twitter.com/kDqoGk0gGi
— Texas Football (@TexasFootball) April 30, 2024

P.S. — USA, USA, USA! Congrats to our Volleyballers getting their shot with Team USA!

🖐 Horns on the @usavolleyball long-list roster for VNL! The most of any school in the country and @MadiSkinnerr is the only collegiate player on the list.

Congrats to @asjiaoneal, @ChiakaOgbogu, @volleyzoe, @ButlerBrionne and @MadiSkinnerr 👏👏👏 pic.twitter.com/BXZ2RTJJzF
— Texas Volleyball (@TexasVolleyball) May 2, 2024

P.S. — We have amazing student-athletes, congrats to Shay Holle and Jeremiah Nubbe!

Finishing the year on an incredible high note with these 2 superstars! Congratulations @shayholle15 + @jeremiah_nubbe! #texcellence #hookem pic.twitter.com/Q8GqjNP3PX
— Texas Academics (@TexasAcademics) May 1, 2024

P.S. — Hook 'Em to our Lifetime Longhorn Rashidat Adeleke who is Paris Bound!