Tournament Featuring Top Three College Softball Teams Begins Thursday

CATHEDRAL CITY (CNS) – The 19th annual Mary Nutter Collegiate Classic softball tournament is scheduled to begin Thursday with 12 games at the Big League Dreams complex in Cathedral City, including top-ranked UCLA facing third-ranked Florida at 7:30 p.m. The 28-team field also includes second-ranked Oklahoma, the two-time reigning NCAA champion. The Sooners (8-1) are scheduled to face the Bruins (12- 0) Sunday, the tournament’s final day. Every game of the tournament will be available for streaming on FloSoftball. Tickets are available at search.events.com/#/org/283789. Any schedule updates will be posted on the tournament’s social media accounts — twitter.com/NutterClassic, facebook.com/MaryNutterCollegiateClassic, instagram.com/nutterclassic and http://www.tiktok.com/@nutterclassic. UCLA moved into first in the USA Thursday/NFCA Division I Top 25 Coaches Poll and ESPN.com/USA Softball Collegiate Top 25 released Tuesday after previously top-ranked Oklahoma lost 4-3 to Baylor Sunday. The Bruins are scheduled to play six games in the tournament. They are set to face Kentucky and Iowa at 5:30 p.m. and 8 p.m. Friday, and 19th- ranked Northwestern and Texas A&M at 2:30 p.m. and 5 p.m. Saturday in addition to Thursday’s game against Florida and Sunday’s against Oklahoma. The tournament field also includes UC Riverside, which is set to face Bethune-Cookman at 12:30 p.m. and Texas Tech at 3 p.m. Thursday, Florida at 1 p.m. Friday and Kentucky at 8 p.m. Saturday. The tournament is named for Mary Nutter, a two-time Amateur Softball Association All-American, who later coached at Plattsburg State and formed a business conducting softball coaches’ clinics throughout the nation, featuring many of the most successful coaches and players in the sport. Nutter died in 2012. Copyright 2023, City News Service, Inc.