From the Assigners

The NCAA has announced a new college softball uniform for the 2022 season. For those of you registered in the NCAA Central Hub, you have seen their announcement. There are 2 options for the 2022 season because the manufacturer (Smitty) states the uniforms will not be available until late 2021 and early 2022.
• Option #1 Conferences can adopt the new uniform.
• Option #2 Use the same uniforms as we used in the 2020 season.

Some of you may remember the NAIA ran into a similar problem when they determined that all conference sports officials purchase and wear the NAIA uniform. The manufacturer could not provide enough uniforms for the entire country, so some officials in basketball had them and many did not. If uniforms did not fit, they had to exchange them and that took 3-5 weeks sometimes.

We do not want to enter into an expensive situation, so these conferences will go with OPTION #2 for the 2022 season of play. Once the uniform company has let us know they are well stocked, we can move forward for the 2023 season and the new uniform shirt, pants, hat will be mandatory.
• Community Colleges in California
• SCIAC D3 conference
• CCAA – D2 conference
• Pac-West – D2 conference
• Big West – D1 conference
• Mt West – D1 conference
• West Coast – D1 conference
• Pac-12 – D1 conference
If any umpires in D1 – D2 – D3 are selected for the Regionals, they will be expected to obtain and wear the new uniform. Regionals are in May, 2022, so the manufacturer should have stock by then.

Locker Room postings since last month’s News & Notes

New articles

Rules Corner: NCAA Softball Major Rule Changes for 2022-2023
Mechanics Corner/Plate/Pitches: Zoned Out – Techniques for Rough Days Behind the Plate

Revised articles

Rules Corner – Batting/On the Pitch; Batter Actions