Poor weather in Greenville, N.C., cut the final day of games short in Series 1, limiting further leaderboard movement for Athletes Unlimited Softball League All-Star Cup athletes at the start of the 2025 season.
This created an interesting scenario as one team was set to claim a 3-0 series while another was guaranteed to finish 0-3. Instead, Team Lorenz and Team Kilfoyl finished with two wins, but Team Ocasio and Team Corrick did not gain a victory.
There is another wrinkle from North Carolina’s games: captainship will not follow the leaderboard results. Twelve players will compete at the 2025 World Games in Chengdu, China, and miss the upcoming series. Absent athletes cannot be captains, so Kayla Kowalik, Sarah Willis, and Kendra Falby will serve as captains during Series 2.
The league will feature only three teams instead of four during its second series (August 19-21 in Rosemont, Illinois), as players compete at the World Games.
An unstoppable duo: Rachel Garcia and Kayla Kowalik
Pitcher Rachel Garcia and catcher Kayla Kowalik were a first-time battery on Team Lorenz during Series 1, but they sure didn’t seem like it. In the season opener, Garcia spun a complete game one-hit shutout, guiding the team to a game win and inning-point sweep. Then on Monday, she entered the game for the final two innings. Her All-Star Cup record stands at 2-0 with only two hits allowed through 9.0 innings of work. Garcia currently leads the league in stat points with 128 so far on the season.
Kowalik called both those games, and it seemed like their comfort on the field translated to productive offense. In both of Team Lorenz’s victories, Kowalik drove in the game-winning run. Her 50 stat points from two doubles and three singles are good for third-best in the league, but MVP points are Kowalik’s differentiator from the rest of the pack.
Kowalik and Garcia are tied with 100 MVP points each, the most of any athletes in Series 1. Garcia leads with 458 total points, with Kowalik behind her at 380.
Team Kilfoyl scattered through the top
Aside from Kowalik and Garcia, three athletes from Team Kilfoyl were the only ones to score over 300 points through two games. The captain, Lexi Kilfoyl, ranks third on the leaderboard with 354 points, with Willis and Falby right behind her with 350 and 330 points, respectively.
Kilfoyl only gave up one earned run in her complete-game outing, racking up 74 stat points. Willis and Falby both earned MVP 1 honors, boosting them to the top.
Up Next
Series 2 will begin on August 19 in Rosemont, Illinois, at 8 p.m. ET as Team Kowalik faces Team Falby. The Series 2 draft will be held on August 12. Fans can check back on the AUSL website and @theauslofficial on social to see the draft results.
The AUSL All-Star Cup is a four-series season from Aug. 2 to 31 in which 60 professional softball players compete to become the individual champion utilizing Athletes Unlimited’s innovative format. Teams are hand-picked by the top athletes on the leaderboard each series. Remaining games for the 2025 All-Star Cup will be played in Rosemont, Illinois.
Savanna Collins is the Senior Reporter for the AUSL. You can follow her on X @savannaecollins.
