Ally Shipman, Jenna Johnson react to Alabama's return to the Women's College Wold Series

After losing the first game of their Tuscaloosa Super Regional matchup with Northwestern on Friday and bouncing back with a win on Saturday, Alabama‘s softball team defeated the Wildcats 3-2 on Sunday in their winner-take-all final to advance to the Women’s College World Series.

The Crimson Tide had their backs against the wall early in the weekend series, but fifth-year senior catcher Ally Shipman said the team never lost faith that they’d make it back to Oklahoma City.

“We’ve been there before, that’s what we said, we’ve been there before,” Shipman said. “No matter what we just have to win two games, whether that was the first two or the last two, it was just two games and we took it one pitch at a time.”

Shipman came up big for Alabama early, driving the ball to left field for a 2 RBI single to give the Crimson Tide their first points of the game and a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the third inning.

Northwestern answered with a run at the top of the fourth, but Jenna Johnson took the momentum back into the hands of the Crimson Tide the following inning with a solo home run off of former unanimous Big Ten Pitcher of the Year Danielle Williams to extend the lead to 3-1.

“She’s a great pitcher and she’s been battling with us all weekend so in that at-bat I just wanted to slow everything down, stay in my legs, and just try to drive a ground ball,” Johnson said. “Honestly, I put a pretty good swing on it and I saw it was curving foul and I was like please Jesus let it stay fair and it went off the pole, so thankful it did.”

Johnson added, “They’re a great program, they fought till the very end clearly and so we wanted to put up as many runs as we could and clearly it was a fight all weekend. Not a lot of runs scored the entire weekend but we’re just thankful to come out on top.”

Pitcher Jaala Torrence started off the day on the mound for Alabama throwing for 3.1 innings with three strikeouts on the day. Star pitcher Montana Fouts closed out the game for the Crimson Tide after previously sustaining a knee injury in the SEC tournament, securing her 25th win of the season and the 100th of her career.

“It’s been incredible just to get to know her and her as a person and not just her as a competitor has been insane,” Shipman said regarding Fouts. “And she gives everything she has to us as people, to us as players, just everybody and just to be her catcher is a joy, it really is.”

Alabama now reached the College Softball World Series for the 14th time in program history, bouncing back from a disappointing elimination last season in Regionals versus Stanford, which acted as motivation for the entire team all season according to Johnson.

“Oh it drove everything, it was the first thing on our mind every day we came to practice, every day we played a game we had the end goal in mind. And so losing in regionals last year, that was so hard and it was a heartbreaking season and so we knew we had something to work for to get back here and it has not been easy. Everything has been a fight,” Johnson said.

The Crimson Tide now face a familiar SEC foe in the first round of the World Series, as they’ll face Tennessee at noon ET on Thursday on ESPN.

“This is everything I’ve ever dreamed about since I was a little kid. This is what I’ve been dreaming of and so this is everything and to do it with this group of girls is even better. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else than on this Bama team right now,” Shipman said.