Bonnie Tholl was, quite literally, knocked off her feet.
The Michigan softball coach was jumping up and down at third base, watching as her Wolverines raced around the base paths after a deep triple to center field. What Tholl didn’t see — at least not until it was too late — was sophomore pinch-runner Madi Ramey rounding third and heading directly towards her.
In scrambling back to avoid a collision, Tholl tumbled to the dirt. And just four innings later, she was floored by her offense once again.
This time it was purely figurative.
It was freshman right fielder Ella Stephenson’s walk-off homer, which ended the game early via a run-rule, clinched the series sweep of Nebraska and kept Michigan undefeated at home.
Yes, the same Ella Stephenson whose last home run — her only home run before Sunday’s game — came in late February.
“She just keeps getting better,” Tholl said Sunday. “It’s the only way I can describe it.”
“Just keeps getting better” is a pretty good way to describe Stephenson’s continuous improvement since Big Ten play began. It’s also a pretty good way to describe the Wolverines as a whole. After going 11-9 in the first month of the season, Michigan has just kept on winning and now sits with a 32-14 record.
And if it seems like the Wolverines keep outdoing themselves at finding improbable ways to win, it’s because they are.
Just one week ago, they were down 5-0 to Iowa heading into the bottom of the fourth inning. In Michigan’s next game against the Hawkeyes on that same day, the Wolverines were down 8-1. And in the series finale against Iowa, Michigan trailed 3-1 in the sixth inning.
Last year’s team couldn’t sweep a single Big Ten series. Last year’s team couldn’t fill its weekends with comebacks and game-winning dingers. Last year’s team crumpled facing those deficits, and were lucky if its season-defining inconsistent offense managed to win two of three games.
This year’s team won all three, in a way that would’ve made last year’s Wolverines jealous.
The first rally was fueled by freshman designated player Ava Costales’ pair of moonshots. The second one came when sophomore pinch-runner Madi Ramey’s first hit of the season went yard for her first collegiate homer. And when Costales emerged from the dugout in the third game after blasting a three-run home run just an inning ago, her game-ending single seemed inevitable.
Michigan is hitting the ball out of the park right now, in every sense of the phrase. Last year’s team had 25 homers on the season. This year, the Wolverines’ 49 bombs nearly double that, and there are at least two weeks of play left.
This offensive rejuvenation didn’t happen overnight. It started in the offseason, after last year’s team failed to make the NCAA Tournament for the first time in 29 years. It continued early this season, after Michigan’s team batting average became mired in the low .200s. And now, with three swept Big Ten series under its belt, the Wolverines’ tweaks and adjustments that Tholl preached would make a difference all season are in full effect.
Tholl has promised that Michigan’s bats would turn the corner so much that it was as if the Wolverines were traipsing around an infinitely-sided shape. But after a slow start to the season, Michigan’s offense delivered on Tholl’s promises.
“A little delayed gratification,” Tholl said. “ … We had to wait a while until we got this rolling. Our first couple of months didn’t look like what it does today, and that’s delayed gratification. I think that they recognize that.”
Tholl knows that the success the Wolverines are basking in right now doesn’t come without some struggle. That manifested itself two weeks ago in Evanston, when Michigan’s offense flashed glimpses of its old self, getting swept by Northwestern with the long ball disappearing.
That series was eerily reminiscent of last season, with the bats going cold one day and heating up the next. Suddenly Michigan’s 10-game win streak didn’t seem as impressive as it looked on paper, and the pressure was on the Wolverines to respond.
“We felt the pain and the agony of defeat,” Tholl said. “They didn’t allow that disappointment to crush them. We turned right back around and we had to play Michigan State and Central Michigan that week, and they rebounded. It speaks to their resiliency.”
That resiliency, whether present or not last season, didn’t manifest itself in rebound win streaks. And luckily for Michigan, it has been spared the pain and agony of defeat since losing three games to the Wildcats. While Michigan State and Central Michigan pale in comparison to Northwestern, a swept series against Nebraska — the third-best team in the Big Ten — is assurance that the Wolverines’ power at the plate isn’t a fluke.
Last year around this time, Michigan’s postseason chances were nonexistent. This year, a postseason berth is becoming more and more likely. Despite stumbling against Northwestern, the Wolverines are soaring.
Maybe if Michigan does return to the NCAA Tournament this year, the youth and inexperience that has mainly propelled the team thus far will plague the Wolverines. Maybe rain will come for Michigan’s current hit parade, and the Wolverines’ flourishing offense will wilt.
Some of those issues inflicted Michigan last year. But right now the Wolverines’ hitting is on fire, and reverting to those struggles seems unlikely for a team that is only getting better.
Because this year, Michigan is different.