Alabama Softball Heads to Oxford for SEC Series March 6–8

Alabama softball will open Southeastern Conference play at Ole Miss in Oxford, Mississippi, March 6–8, with first pitches listed at 6 p.m. CT Friday and Saturday and 1 p.m. CT Sunday on the University of Alabama Athletics schedule. The No. 7 Crimson Tide arrives at the series 20-0, a streak that makes the road trip the program’s first SEC test of the season.

Tuscaloosa reporting and Alabama’s official box scores show how Alabama reached 20-0. The Crimson Tide recorded a midweek 8-0, five-inning win over UAB on Tuesday, Feb. 24, then swept the six-team T-Mobile Crimson Classic. That weekend included a 2-0 shutout of St. Thomas, an 8-0 five-inning win over South Florida on Feb. 27, an 8-1 victory over Kent State, another 8-0 five-inning run-rule win over USF, a 7-0 shutout of St. Thomas and an 8-1 win over Oakland. Tuscaloosa News reports Alabama produced three run-rule wins that week and has eight run-rule victories overall this season.

Offense and pitching names appear in Alabama’s media materials. RollTide highlights that the Crimson Tide “outscored Purdue and Liberty 34-3 highlighted by the hitting of Vandagriff and the pitching of Moten” in early February results. Those performances underpin Alabama’s run-rule stretch, which includes multiple five-inning victories recorded on Feb. 5, Feb. 13 and Feb. 14 in the RollTide game log excerpts.

Coach Patrick Murphy added a social-media flourish ahead of the Oxford trip. “Alabama softball coach Patrick Murphy shared a massive batting practice homer, hyping the upcoming game in Oxford, MS this Friday.” The team’s official schedule and local coverage list the Ole Miss weekend as Alabama’s first conference series after nonconference play.

The matchup carries immediate context against Ole Miss. The Crimson White notes, “Last season Alabama and Ole Miss never met, but they ended with similar records.” The campus paper also records SEC Tournament finishes: “Both teams made it past the first round of the SEC Tournament last year, but Alabama fell in the second while the Rebels fell in the third. Ole Miss’ season lasted longer as they made it to Oklahoma City, where they got swept by Texas Tech and Oregon.”

Local media and talk shows have already framed the weekend as a measuring stick. BamaCentral’s Joe Gaither Show Episode 626, hosted by Joe Gaither with Theo Fernandez and Katie Windham, asked directly, “Can Alabama go into Oxford and beat a struggling Ole Miss team that stylistically challenges the Crimson Tide? Ole Miss has two elite rebounders in the front court, who has to step up for Alabama to keep them off the glass?” The episode also featured a softball segment titled “Jocelyn Briski on 'Pitch Limit' for Alabama Softball's Opening Home Series.”

Alabama’s official schedule lists the Ole Miss dates and times and remains the primary public timetable; RollTide shows Mar. 6 (Fri) 6 p.m. CT, Mar. 7 (Sat) 6 p.m. CT and Mar. 8 (Sun) 1 p.m. CT. The conference slate, as noted in The Crimson White, will consist of an even split of four home and four away SEC series, with the SEC Tournament set for Lexington, Kentucky. Friday’s first pitch in Oxford will be the first concrete test of Alabama’s 20-0 start and the first entry on the Tide’s 2026 SEC ledger.