How a player-led meeting changed everything for South Carolina in 2025
The great teams always seem to have that one moment where it all comes together — the turning point. South Carolina softball’s came when it was still a team many believed would finish last in the SEC.
In the fall, the Gamecocks were working out their kinks, with six returning players and 15 newcomers, six of whom followed first-year head coach Ashley Chastain Woodard from Charlotte. Their strong chemistry, which would lead to eventual success, still had a ways to go.
With the season months away, the seniors on the team called a players-only meeting to set their goals for 2025. It was the moment that junior first baseman Arianna Rodi would later describe as “the biggest turning point in the preseason.”
“One of the biggest things,” Rodi said during The Gamecock Club Hour on 107.5 The Game, “was getting rid of all the titles between the returners, the transfers, the Charlotte group, and coming together and saying, ‘Well, we’re all here playing for South Carolina, so we’re all part of the South Carolina softball team.'”
From that point on, everything started to come together by the time the fall wrapped up. This group now felt confident in what it could do, leading to one of the best seasons in program history.
South Carolina exceeded all expectations and took college softball by storm in one of the biggest surprises of the year. The Gamecocks won 44 games, the most under a first-year coach with Chastain at the helm.
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The season ended in disappointment after falling one win short of the Women’s College World Series. In actuality, South Carolina was one out away from punching their ticket to Oklahoma City. But it wasn’t meant to be, as UCLA won the final two games of the Columbia Super Regional.
“It was tough. It was quiet for a while in the locker room,” Rodi said. “But then Coach Ash came in and was like, ‘Do you guys realize what you just did? Like, you guys were picked last in the SEC, and you were one game away from Oklahoma City.'”
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“So I think just having really good perspective on what we did accomplish this season was a lot easier for us to understand and take everything in from what happened this season. Ending it not the way we wanted to, but just being proud of everything that we did do.”
Less than a week removed from the Gamecocks’ season-ending loss, Rodi admitted it’s now easier to process everything. Much like everyone else, she couldn’t help but think that they were one out away from advancing.
“Now I’m just so grateful for the season that we did have, and the experience that we had together, and kind of the magic that we brought to Columbia,” she said.
Rodi, who led the team with 17 homers and 55 RBIs, will be back for her senior year at South Carolina. With other key players returning, along with the new faces coming in, they’ll have a chance to get back to this point next season, potentially with a better outcome.
But none of it would be possible without the 2025 team that laid the groundwork for a program that will be viewed much differently for years to come.
“The belief and the friendship and everything that came from this season, it’s hard to put into words,” Rodi said. “We just believed in a small, little dream. And all 21 of us believed in it, and everything happened. It’s so magical that something special could come out just in one season.”
