Lady Vols Lose Star Player To Oil-Rich Mega Boosters
Image: Tennessee Athletics
By Garrett Armbrust
Taylor Pannell is headed to Lubbock.
The Lady Vols third baseman was one of the important pieces to the softball team’s Women’s College World Series run to Oklahoma City this year.
Pannell entered the transfer portal yesterday with a “do not contact” tag and quickly announced that she had committed to Texas Tech.
The Red Raiders were one of the best teams in the nation this past season. They finished as the national runner-up after losing to Texas last week in the finals of the WCWS.
Pannell, who was an All-American, had a career batting average of .351 with 25 HRs and 102 RBIs.
We’ve seen the transfer portal explode in football, baseball, and basketball over the past few seasons in the NIL era of the NCAA but now it even appears softball is beginning to see its effects.
Texas Tech mega boosters John and Tracy Sellers, along with fellow billionaire Cody Campbell, seem to be set on bringing their school a softball national title, and they’re willing to spend a lot of oil money to do so.
What a feeling it must be to sell an oil company for $6.4 billion.
If some of the rumors are true of what Pannell could have potentially been paid to transfer — it could be up in the seven-figure range — then this jump seems to make sense.
Of course, it makes you wonder if there was any way that Tennessee would’ve been able to match that number.
Lady Vols radio announcer Brian Rice had something to say about the decision: