The Oklahoma Sooners have done a fantastic job retooling their roster with their high school recruiting prowess and through the transfer portal. Oklahoma’s star power is homegrown, but there’s no denying the impact the portal had on this year’s team.
Alex Storako, Haley Lee, Alyssa Brito, Alynah Torres and Cydney Sanders played significant roles in Oklahoma’s 61-1 national championship season. With Storako and Lee out of eligibility and Grace Lyons departing, there’s room for the Sooners to dip into the portal for an infusion of talent.
One player they should take a look at is Indiana’s Taryn Kern. Kern led the Hoosiers with a .404 batting average, 23 home runs, 68 RBIs and 68 runs scored. Each of those marks broke Indiana softball single-season records. She was second in the nation in home runs and fifth in runs batted in.
In the NCAA tournament, Kern hit ,300 with one home run, two RBIs, and three runs scored in four games in the Knoxville Regional.
As a freshman, Kern was a D1Softball All-American and NFCA second-team All-American and an NFCA freshman of the year finalist in 2023. Kern was Big Ten Freshman of the Week six times and was named Big Ten Freshman of the Year in 2023.
She played second base for Indiana, which would either require Kern or Tiare Jennings to move to shortstop.
The Oklahoma Sooners have a great deal of talent coming back for the 2024 season, and they will be the favorite to win the national title yet again. But if they wanted to bolster their ranks further, taking a run at Kern would provide another great bat to the lineup.
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