OKLAHOMA CITY — Greater than a decade earlier than Tennessee’s Karlyn Pickens fired the quickest softball pitch ever recorded, Dana Fussetti found an elementary school-aged pitcher and foretold a prophecy.
Fussetti, a Greenville, South Carolina-based softball coach, was in the midst of a hitting lesson when she first recognized Pickens and her overwhelming promise. The eventual All-American ace was simply 10 years previous on the time. However from throughout the power, Fussetti shortly turned transfixed by the “lanky, bean-pole,” who had lengthy arms, polished mechanics and velocity within the mid-50s.
Fussetti spent the following hour watching Pickens throw, so consumed with the talent-beyond-her-years pitcher that she ended up giving the hitting session away at no cost.
“I couldn’t take my eyes off of her,” Fussetti instructed ESPN. “After my lesson, I sat down with Karlyn’s dad, Phil. I instructed him: ‘In case your daughter sticks with softball, she would be the hardest throwing pitcher within the historical past of the game.”‘
Earlier this spring, Fussetti’s prediction got here true. In a aid outing towards Arkansas on March 24, Pickens was clocked at 78.2 miles per hour, shattering the sport’s earlier all-time mark of 77 mph. Two months later, Pickens broke her personal report on the 79.4 mph fireball she threw to Nebraska’s Jordy Bahl within the first inning of Recreation 2 within the Knoxville Tremendous Regional.
“I known as her dad after she broke the report towards Arkansas,” Fussetti mentioned. “He mentioned, ‘Effectively, you had been proper.’ He actually thought I used to be simply attempting to blow sunshine up their butts. However I knew this child was wonderful. She’s one in one million.”
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Tennessee’s Karlyn Pickens throws quickest pitch in NCAA softball historical past
Tennessee pitcher Karlyn Pickens fires a 78.2 mph strike for the fastest-recorded pitch in school softball historical past.
Pickens has emerged as not solely the toughest thrower softball has ever seen, however one of many sport’s elite pitchers in her junior season this spring.
Pickens entered play on the 2025 WCWS this week ranked second nationally in ERA (1.00), fifth in strikeouts (280) and seventh in innings pitched (204). She spent the majority of the Girl Vols’ WCWS opener towards Oklahoma mowing down the four-time defending champions, putting out seven Sooners and permitting just one run on three hits over the preliminary six innings.
The one stains on Pickens’ third-ever WCWS outing: a pair of residence runs off the bat of Oklahoma’s Ella Parker, together with a three-run, walk-off blast that despatched No. 7 seed Tennessee into the match’s losers bracket.
On Friday, with the Girl Vols’ season on the road towards No. 3 seed Florida (7 p.m. ET, ESPN2), Pickens is predicted to be within the circle once more.
“Karlyn is as regular as they arrive,” Tennessee coach Karen Weekly mentioned Thursday. “She’s the final word warrior. Ninety-nine instances out of 100, she wins that recreation [today]. What I anticipate going into tomorrow from Karlyn and this complete group, we have been right here [before].”
How did Pickens come to tackle a significant position with the Girl Vols and throw the quickest pitches in softball historical past? Fussetti is not the one one who noticed it coming.
Stacey Whitfield-Johnson, who led Furman’s softball program from 2021 to 2025, was the pitching coach working with Pickens the day Fussetti noticed her. Not lengthy after, Pickens — who needed to look past her hometown of Weaverville, North Carolina, for elite softball — joined Carolina Elite, a journey ball group Fussetti and Whitfield-Johnson helped run.
Blessed with fingers that may palm basketballs, lengthy arms and ultimately a 6-foot-1 construct, paired with a perpetual eagerness to hone each a part of her pitching movement, Pickens developed right into a flamethrower.
At 12 years previous, Pickens was hitting 60 mph on the radar gun, and her velocity rose steadily by way of highschool. By the point she dedicated to Tennessee as a junior in November 2021, Pickens was constantly clocking in at 70 mph and taking a toll on the catchers at North Carolina’s North Buncombe Excessive Faculty.
“Our catcher Juliana Mendoza must tape her fingers after video games as a result of they had been simply bruised. She even tried EvoShield pads to cease the pressure from her hand,” former North Buncombe head coach Tiffani Ferguson mentioned.
Pickens’ pace made her an unusual energy arm in rural North Carolina. Within the school ranks, she has solely a lot extra firm. Lots of the high pitchers within the sport max out someplace between 60 to 70 mph, distinguishing themselves on their capability to combine pitches and modifications. A handful of the sport’s hardest throwers hold within the mid-70s — Texas Tech’s NiJaree Canady hit 75 mph whereas pitching for Stanford within the 2024 WCWS.
Monica Abbott, the USA Softball Collegiate Participant of the Yr in 2007 and a two-time Olympic medalist, is aware of velocity properly. It was the previous Girl Vol who set the earlier report for quickest pitch with a 77 mph fastball in a Nationwide Professional Fastpitch recreation in 2012. Pickens matched that mark twice earlier this season earlier than eclipsing Abbott’s report.
“You do not get up at some point throwing 70 or 75 or 79 mph,” Abbott mentioned. “There’s so many components that go into being profitable at that pace. Work ethic and consistency like Karlyn has is the way you get your pace to leap like that.”
In 2023, Pickens made 28 appearances and was named SEC Freshman of the Yr. However from a hard-throwing freshman who at instances struggled with command, she has developed right into a managed fireballer and a flexible pitcher over three seasons at Tennessee.
Pickens, a three-sport athlete in highschool, has remodeled her bodily body beneath a dedicated softball focus and a Division I energy program. A transfer into the full-time position has shifted her mentality as a program chief from the circle. And dealing with Girl Vols pitching coach Megan Rhodes Smith, Pickens has developed her secondary pitches, sharpening the rise ball, drop ball and changeup that now complement her fastball.
“I keep in mind coming into this 12 months, she mentioned: My purpose is not to simply throw them. My purpose is to like them as a lot as I like throwing my fastball,” Weekly mentioned. “That is why you see her doing what she’s doing now.”
Watching from residence, Abbott — who has grown shut with Pickens over the previous 12 months — and former coaches see a brand new model of willpower within the sometimes confident pitcher main the Girl Vols this spring. Geared up with an improved repertoire and an ace mentality, Pickens cooly navigated tremendous regional jams and several other difficult spots towards Oklahoma on Thursday, the identical confidence that Pickens believes helped push her velocity to 79.4 mph.
“I might say my group fuels actually all of my pitching, understanding that they are behind me, understanding that my purpose is to, on the finish of the day, win for my group,” Pickens mentioned this week. “So I feel that could be a massive motivator for me to proceed to push and develop as a pitcher and attain new heights.”
Abbott has been most impressed with Pickens’ calm demeanor and focus this spring. Oklahoma coach Patty Gasso has recommended her for setting a brand new customary throughout the game.
“There’s a whole lot of little women which might be going to be going, ‘Wow, I simply hit 60 mph. Solely 19 extra miles [per hour] to go!”‘ the eight-time nationwide champion mentioned.
On Friday, Pickens will get the chance to put in writing the newest chapter in her junior season in a do-or-die elimination recreation towards Florida.
What lies forward for Pickens — on the WCWS, in her senior season subsequent spring, with NIL as the game’s premier energy pitcher — is unknown. From South Carolina, nevertheless, Fussetti has one prediction.
“When Karlyn hangs out at a sure quantity for some time, there’s about to be one other leap,” she mentioned. “She might be hitting in all probability 80-81 mph earlier than she graduates.”
