A number of things make the Athletes Unlimited Softball League the high-quality league it is. One in particular is the competition across the board. The six-team league has the best of the best top to bottom, and the margin for error is thin. Any team one through six can win on any given day, and records don’t tell the whole story.
Each team in the league saw its share of adversity during the 2026 regular season. Flip a game here or there for some, and the postseason landscape would look much different. In their first season, the Oklahoma City Spark found that out firsthand. They rode the highs and lows just as any other team had, and fell one win shy of the play-in game.
Thursday I asked Spark head coach Amber Flores how long it took her to see the competitive difference from playing as an independent team to being in the AUSL. It did not take long.
For Flores, the realization came before the games even counted. The Spark opened the preseason with a scrimmage in Florida against the Utah Talons, and who stood in the circle told her everything.
“I quickly realized, our first scrimmage out in Florida, we were playing the Talons,” Flores said. “I’m like, this is the real deal right here. We had Montana Fouts coming out there, and it’s like, okay, this is gonna be the real deal.”
That feeling never left. If there was one lesson from a first season spent in the middle of the standings, it was that a win in this league is never a given.
“The one thing I will say that really people don’t understand, and I didn’t understand coming into this, is how hard it is to win a ballgame in this league,” Flores said. “It is hard. Every pitch is hard, every out feels hard sometimes.”
Nowhere did that show up more plainly than in the Spark’s final push. Needing to win seven of their last eight to keep postseason hopes alive, Oklahoma City walked into a run of the best arms the sport has to offer and went to work.
“We go down to the Volts, and we have to beat NiJa, and we have to beat Rachel Garcia, two of the best pitchers in the world right now,” Flores said. “That’s something that people don’t recognize or realize. It is so difficult, no matter who you’re playing. The talent level, every roster is so incredibly deep and talented.”
Taking two of three from the Talons is what started the late-season push. From there, the Spark took down the Texas Volts on the road in both games. At Carolina, they defeated the Blaze in games one and two. Then it ended, one win short, against Devyn Netz. Flores wanted to be clear about what that final loss actually said about the league.
“While people may look at Devyn Netz and say, well, she’s not on the level of those other seven pitchers you just faced, how come you can’t get it done?” Flores said. “Devyn Netz was the best arm that we saw in those eight games. She was incredible against us.”
Also, it was not just Netz. The Spark ran into a hot Blaze offense that had saved one of their best days for last. Before a weather delay suspended play overnight, Carolina jumped on the Spark early and never let them back in. Oklahoma City could not climb out the next morning, and the season ended there.
That is the point records alone will never capture. The Spark finished with 13 wins, three back of the league’s best mark, with the best offense in the league by Flores’ own measure, and it still was not enough to clinch a playoff spot.
“When I say it is so hard to win a ballgame, it is so hard to win a ballgame,” Flores said. “We had the best offense pound for pound in the league, I thought, and it’s still hard, it’s still difficult. We’re hitting home runs like crazy, it’s just not that easy.”
That is the AUSL. Six teams, no soft spots, and standings that only tell part of the story. Oklahoma City learned that brutal lesson in 2026, and they like where they are headed in 2027. Flores and the Spark will carry everything this season has taught them into the next one, with a year of experience to build on and a roster they believe can close the gap.
