Our Focus:  Our primary focus is to create a collegiate-level playing experience for our girls. There is an attitude in the softball world that playing as a "travel ball" team is the only way to accomplish that.  However, while we probably travel more than 98% of the teams out there, we feel that assembling a group of 12 girls who play softball only for the Gators, and working with them year-round, trying to improve their capabilities within our team framework, is the closest we can come to emulating a collegiate experience.  We focus on performing well in our league and also in tournaments leading up to the highest quality national tournament available to us at the end of the year.  Just as college teams do, we begin our year in August with fall ball and work together into the following summer.  Middle school, high school and college teams cannot use pickup players for specific tournaments or playoffs, so we choose not to as well.  Our emphasis is on improving through player development rather than player acquisition.


Winning & Losing:  We try very very hard to play and perform well.  On defense, we work hard to get outs, and on offense, we strive to score runs, which if we do well, will result in wins.  Yet, you will not hear coaches talking to girls about winning a game, beating a team, gaining revenge, settling a score, etc.  And we don't expect 10-year-olds to dedicate their lives to winning softball games.  However, we do not think they are too young to begin learning to compete.  We do not use the concept of "keeping things in perspective" as an excuse for underachievement.  Our girls are expected to enjoy competing at a very high level, and we will always strive to do everything in a first-class way.


Role of Parents:  The parents are our front-line in educating our girls on our three most basic principles:  Gators First, Teammates Next, Me Third.  


Practice:   Practice time as a team is our most important time together.  It is considered almost sacred.  There are obviously circumstances that come into play from time to time, however, our girls basically don't miss practice.....ever.  Most of our practices, with the exception of various camps, are limited to two hours, and are very well structured and designed for the girls to learn the basic fundamentals, plus have fun.   During a season, Fall or Spring, we play league doubleheaders one night a week, practice as a team one night, and each girl comes to the hitting facility for extra work one day a week.  When the girls come to the hitting facility, it usually takes them just an hour to work through the hitting stations.  In the off-season, we get together weekly, for a couple of hours, to work on basic fundamentals.  Also many girls put in much more time coming and working extra at The Swamp and The Jungle.


Tournaments:   The girls really enjoy playing in tournaments, and the coaches and parents feel that playing in multiple games on a weekend is a good learning experience for our girls.  However, we will not play in tournaments simply for the sake of bragging that we play in lots of tournaments, nor will we shy away from them if the players and parents want to play more.  This is always totally dictated by the team.  For the Spring of 2012 we plan on playing in approximately 12-15 tournaments, throughout the Oklahoma City metro, as well as overnight trips to Tulsa, Round Rock, TX, Grapevine, TX, Wichita, KS, Springdale, AR and Branson, MO.
 

Roster:  Our desire is to have 12 girls on our roster with an emphasis on 2001 birthdates.   Our current roster is composed of 11 players, 8 girls with 2001 birthdates, and 3 born in 2002.  We are currently looking to add one girl under the right circumstances.  To play for us, a girl, and her parents, must have an extremely strong work ethic, be willing to put the team first, be extremely loyal and charitably inclined, as Gator Girls are expected to do things to give back to the community as a whole.  We are not looking for part-time players.  Our philosophy is that you are either a Gator or you're not.