Cajun softball is now in full effect as the Cajuns started their season over the weekend in the 37th annual Louisiana classics. The Cajuns have a lot of high hopes for this season as they return a lot of familiar faces from a team that won 47 games and an SBC tournament title last year. College softball experts have a lot of expectations for the Cajuns as well as they started the weekend as D1-Softball’s 20th-ranked team.

The squad moved down to the 21st spot in this week’s rankings after a 4-0 start to the season with three of those wins coming in run-rule fashion. Cajun fans shouldn’t worry about the drop in rankings as they now head to a Clearwater Invitational tournament that is stacked with elite competition. This weekend is the most important weekend of the Cajuns 2023 season and here is why.

The Cajuns have been known for their dominance in SBC for the last decade now, with 7 SBC tournament titles in the last ten years and 23 consecutive NCAA tournament appearances. The Cajuns seem to always finish with a massive number in the win column every year, but a lackluster SBC keeps the Cajuns from Claiming one of sixteen national seeds at the end of the year.

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A large reason for that has been Cajun’s inability to win the big non-conference matchups. In some of the Cajun’s biggest non-conference games from a year ago, they were swept by Alabama and LSU while losing two of three to Texas. The Cajuns were known as a dominant mid-major team that just couldn’t get over the hump. This season, the Cajuns are looking to change the narrative of the most brutal non-conference schedules that have had in years, and it starts this weekend.

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The Cajuns get the tournament started on Thursday as they take on unranked Indiana and unranked Michigan on Friday. They then go on to face Oklahoma State, Arkansas, and UCLA who are all ranked in the top 5. They close out the weekend with the 7th-ranked Seminoles of Florida State. Before leaving the state of Florida, they will head to Orlando to take on the 19th-ranked UCF Knights. This is a crucial weekend for the Cajuns getting a shot to host a regional this year. If the Cajuns can win four of these next seven games, I believe this will go a long way in getting them a top 16 seed when the committee gathers on election day.

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If the Cajuns want the road the WCWS to go through Lamson Park, they need to have a positive record after this weekend. The Cajuns start the Clearwater Invitational tournament this Thursday as they take on Indiana at Noon. You can watch the game over on ESPNU or turn that dial to 103.3 the GOAT to listen to Jay Walker’s call of the game.

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