Athletics

USF ATHLETICS’ GAME-CHANGING, $22 million Indoor Performance Facility has risen on the east end of the Tampa campus and is now an impressive addition to the athletics campus set to open later this fall.

Entirely powered by philanthropy, the facility will serve not only the football program and shut out the unpredictable Florida weather, but will be a training and recruiting enhancement for all of the Bulls’ athletics programs and a major event space for other campus constituents.

Ground was broken last September on the 88,000-squarefoot facility, which will house a full 100-yard turf field, and, after several weeks of preparing the site, steel beams began rising into the sky when the calendar turned to 2022. With the framework in place by the end of April, the exterior of the massive building began to take shape in May.

“This is a transformational facility for us,’’ Michael Kelly, USF’s vice president of athletics, says. “As we continue to challenge for conference and national championships, this facility will be a very key element.”

Kelly said $25 million was raised for the training center, the highest total for any fundraising project in USF’s 55-year athletic history, which included a new $3 million football team locker room in the Lee Roy Selmon Center that opened last fall.

The recommended site for a new on-campus football stadium, which is moving forward at a rapid pace, is adjacent to the training facility on the east end of campus and will create a vibrant and cohesive athletics campus that will be the envy of many in college athletics and help USF continue to recruit the best and brightest student-athletes, coaches and staff.

“This is a very exciting time,’’ Kelly says. “There’s a lot going on. But our student-athletes at USF deserve these things and we’re really excited to go into this new era.’’

USF SOFTBALL PITCHER GEORGINA CORRICK capped a historic career with a tremendous senior season in 2022. Named the National Fastpitch Coaches Association National Pitcher of the Year and a USA Softball Collegiate Player of the Year Top Three Finalist, she finished the season with a 37-5 record, a 0.51 ERA and 418 strikeouts to post one of the most dominant seasons in National Collegiate Athletic Association softball history. Corrick was also named the NCAA statistical champion in wins, ERA and strikeouts, becoming the first in NCAA softball history to capture the “pitching triple crown” by leading in all three categories.

“Those that were able to witness what has to be considered one of the greatest seasons to be put together by any athlete at USF can appreciate what Georgina Corrick accomplished,” USF softball head Coach Ken Eriksen, ’84, Life Member says. “What was even more impressive was my up-close view of the woman that Ms. Corrick is and how her leadership enabled our team to be very successful. Players feed off of other players. She was our ‘North Star’ in the clubhouse. That’s special.”

The only pitcher to be named the American Athletic Conference Pitcher of the Year in each of her four seasons of eligibility, Corrick threw two perfect games and a no-hitter during the 2022 campaign, bringing her career total to eight solo no-hitters and nine overall. At one point in the season, her ERA was as low as 0.06 after over 100 innings, including the NCAA’s seventh-longest streak of consecutive scoreless innings at 88.1. She also made history by breaking USF’s single-game strikeout record, tallying 19 against Florida Gulf Coast University on March 2. Academically, Corrick is a three-time CoSIDA (College Sports Information Directors of America) Academic All-American, earning third-team honors in 2020-21, first-team honors in 2019-20 and being named Academic Team Member of the Year in 2021-22.

The program’s second three-time All-American with a first-team selection in 2022, Corrick ended her collegiate softball career owning 40 USF or conference records. She tallied 113 wins, 55 shutouts and 1,302 strikeouts, which ranks 25th among career strikeout totals in NCAA history.

Corrick was drafted into two professional softball leagues and tied another USF softball player, Monica Triner, as the highest draft pick in USF Athletics history after being selected No. 2 overall by the USSSA (U.S. Specialty Sports Association) Pride in the 2022 Women’s Professional Fastpitch College Draft. She currently plays in the Athletes Unlimited softball league and played for the Great Britain National Team, alongside fellow USF alum Lauren Evans, ‘18, in the Women’s Softball European Championship in July.