Miami University softball Head Coach, Mandy Gardner-Colegate has driven the team to an overall record of 26-19 (26 wins and 19 losses) with a conference record of 15-4 (15 wins and 4 losses), fewer than 3 months into her first season. The team’s conference record has Miami University first in the 2025 Mid-American Conference (MAC) softball standings.
The 2025 season marks Coach Colegate’s 10th year as a coach. Colegate started her career at Grand Canyon University as a graduate student. There, she was promoted to an assistant, where she gained experience. Later, she went to UC San Diego for a year and coached at Iowa for two.
Now, Colegate has her first opportunity as a head coach, with a program that has won its conference championship five years in a row.
Recently, Miami softball has been dominant in the MAC Tournament. The softball team won titles in 2019, 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024 (2020 MAC Championships canceled for Covid-19). Achieving this automatically seeds the victors in the NCAA Division I softball championship.
Coach Gardner-Colegate said the program has had a certain standard of excellence for years. A standard that directs the program to play at the highest level of performance possible. Which, Coach Colegate said, means getting to the NCAA softball championship.
This mindset was adopted by former head coaches Kirin Kumar and Clarisa Crowell – two coaches who shaped the program to be what it is today.
“A standard of excellence was set with 2K (Coach Kumar) and Clarisa,” said Colegate. “We’ve been a successful program for 25 years, we don’t need to talk about winning, we just do it. When winning starts to build, something really special can happen.”
With eight girls moving on from the team in 2024 and only eight returning, Colegate was left with just two players who started the season prior. The Miami softball team was almost entirely new going into the 2025 season.
Colegate and her team worked to fill those empty spots, leaning on her two returning starters to hold up the standard of excellence set in years prior. She said her team worked to bring transfers in from other programs with the same standards.
“In the beginning of the season, we worked to put it all together,” said Colegate. “With so many new pieces we knew this year was going to look different. Luckily, everyone bit in and it’s been really fun to see.”
Oxford resident and Miami softball fan, Ben Eisenbraun, has only missed a few home games this season. He watched the softball team in years prior, witnessing victory after victory.
Eisenbraun was skeptical about a new head coach coming into the program at first. He was curious if Colegate could deliver the same standard of excellence he’s seen before. Now, he’s not worried in the slightest.
“With the history of the program, coach Colegate has had some big shoes to fill,” Eisenbraun said. “But so far, she has done nothing but deliver. I can even tell from the stands she is a great leader.”
The 2025 MAC Tournament is being played in Akron, Ohio, starting May 7. The Miami softball team ends conference play May 4, against Buffalo. For tickets and to follow the remaining Miami softball season, visit the Miami softball website.
