Stanford Women's Basketball, Softball Appear Set Up For Future Dominance

Softball and women's basketball. Even with golf, water polo and a number of terrific women's sports programs on campus, those two often come to mind when people think of women's sports at Stanford.

For decades, women's basketball has been in the upper echelon of the NCAA, with legendary head coach Tara VanDerveer guiding the program to 13 Final Fours and three national titles during her 38 years in charge.

Softball saw extreme success from the late 1990s until the early 2010s and after half a decade of struggle, have since returned to national prominence under current head coach, Jessica Allister. But are both of these programs well equipped for future success?

When it comes to the Cardinal women's basketball program, you can never count them out. Even though they experienced their worst season since the 1980s by going 16-15 and missing the NCAA tournament for the first time since 1987, it all came during a major time of change--with the program being in a new conference and having a new head coach in Kate Paye.

But, the Cardinal have one of the top recruiting classes in the nation coming in for 2025-26, bringing in three five-star prospects in Hailee Swan, Lara Somfai and Alex Eschmeyer and two four-stars in Nora Ezike and Carly Amborn.

Most of Stanford's teams have had superstar players, from the Ogwumike sisters to Cameron Brink. However, this season saw the program really struggle to figure out who that headlining player was, but having Somfai, Swann and Eschmeyer enter the mix for next season could see the Cardinal reestablish that star-studded identity that made them so good for all those years and return to the NCAA tournament after a one season absence.

When it comes to softball, more dominance could be on the horizon. A large number of the key contributors from this season, such as Joie Economides, River Mahler, Emily Jones, Kyra Chan and Zoe Prystajko, among a slew of others are slated to return for next season and beyond.

Assuming a limited number of those players enter the portal, the Cardinal have the opportunity to put together a lineup with a lot of continuity.

Despite a strong 42-13 record and being ranked in the Top 25 for almost the entire season, this season can actually be considered a down year for the Cardinal in many regards, losing in the NCAA regional and falling just short of a third straight Women's College World Series appearance--a good sign that the best is still yet to come.

This was the first season that the Cardinal were in the ACC and they still did very well. Now they will enter 2026 with a season under their belt in the conference and a largely familiar roster, the ceiling of success for Stanford could be very high.

Both programs have invested a lot in their futures and have high expectations for themselves on a yearly basis. From what they have shown historically, it would not be surprising at all if both softball and women's basketball return to be being among the best in the country as soon as next season.