The end is near, if it wasn't there already.
After 153 consecutive weeks being ranked in the NFCA Top 25, ASU softball is hanging on a thread. ASU (30-18, 8-9 Pac-12) sits No. 24 in this week’s poll, its worst ranking since the beginning of the 2006 season, when it was not ranked at all.
After ASU catapulted into the top-10 team in mid-2006, it remained in the top-10 in all but seven weeks heading in to the 2015 season. I included a chart of ASU's rankings from 2006 to the present.
The Sun Devils were one of the best softball programs from 2006-14, making the Women's College World Series seven times, the most of any school (and all under former coach Clint Myers.)
But in 2015, ASU slipped, predictably. ASU perhaps knew too, with the team's slogan "All That Matters Is What We Believe."
While ASU has turned into a shell of its former self, Myers took an Auburn team that was one of two SEC programs to miss the NCAA Tournament in 2013 to the No. 8 ranking in just his second season there.
ASU lost its pitching and base-stealing ability from 2014. Pitchers Dallas Escobedo and Mackenzie Popsecue exhausted their eligibility in 2014, leaving a gaping hole on the mound. Kansas transfer Kelsey Kessler, who could have been the stopgap for ASU's two freshman pitchers, was ineligible in 2015. ASU's ERA in 2015 is on pace to be its worst ever and twice that of what it was the previous season.
The freshman duo of Breanna Macha and Dale Ryndak should improve as their careers develop. But how much?
Perhaps the more under-the-radar concern this season has been the lack of stolen bases. ASU ranks No. 284 of 289 Division I teams with 0.21 steals per game. ASU had 48 stolen bases in 2014, and in 48 games this season, ASU has just 10.
On the mound, ASU lost its way in 2015. The offense is next to go.
Of ASU's four batters with double-digit home runs in 2015, only sophomore shortstop Chelsea Gonzales returns. The Sun Devils will have to replace five offensive starters, including All-American catcher Amber Freeman, first baseman Bethany Kemp and third baseman Haley Steele in 2016. ASU also departs corner outfielders Elizabeth Caporuscio and Sierra Rodriguez.
We could be looking at a second consecutive rebuilding year. Even in the bridge years between Katie Burkhart and Escobedo, ASU managed host in the postseason, which is looking less and less likely for this year's squad by the week.
ASU has competed with some of the sport's best in 2015. It defeated No. 3 Michigan (45-6) in one of three games, split against No. 5 Oklahoma (42-7) and took a series in Tuscon from No. 16 Arizona (37-12, 12-6 Pac-12).
But no longer does ASU strike fear in its opponents. The Sun Devils are just another team.
Reach the sports editor at jmjanss1@asu.edu or follow @jjanssen11 on Twitter
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