Chasing History: Why Oklahoma's Jocelyn Alo Always Pictured Herself as Softball's HR Queen

When she met OU record-setter Lauren Chamberlain five years ago, nobody believed 96 home runs was a possibility — nobody except Alo and her dad, that is.

It was 2018, and freshman softball phenom Jocelyn Alo was just getting her college career started.

During a break in the action at the Mary Nutter Classic in Palm Springs, CA, Oklahoma coach Patty Gasso called Alo over to meet somebody special.

Lauren Chamberlain.

Alo recalls the meeting and seems just a little embarrassed that she had a “fangirl” moment when Gasso made the introductions.

“Aw, that’s sweet,” Chamberlain said with a laugh earlier this week. “That's cool.”

What Chamberlain didn’t know was that, five years later, the two of them would be together again in Palm Springs. She didn’t know that Alo would be on the precipice of breaking — shattering — her all-time mark for NCAA career home runs.

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Mary Nutter Classic: How to Watch

Big League Dreams Park, Cathedral City, CA

(All games on FloSports.com/SoonerSports.com)

• Friday vs. Cal State Fullerton, 2:30 p.m.
• Friday vs. Long Beach State, 5 p.m.
• Saturday vs. Arizona, noon
• Saturday vs. Tennessee, 2:30 p.m.
• Sunday vs. Utah, 11 a.m.

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But Alo knew.

“Ever since I was young,” Alo told SI Sooners Tuesday on a Zoom call. “I’ve kind of had this in my head for a while.”

The enormity of hitting 95 home runs over the course of a softball career is something only two people have known. Soon — possibly very soon — Alo will hit No. 96. Then, in a blink, she’ll be over 100. She could easily set the new mark over 120, maybe 130 if she stays in the zone she’s in now.

Not that Chamberlain didn’t see any of this coming.

“I immediately was like, ‘Dude, you're so strong,’ ” Chamberlain said. “Her stature, you're just like, you know. It's almost like, hitter respect hitter. Like, when you see another one you're like, ‘Alright, bro.’ Like, this is gonna be so fun.

Chamberlain isn’t just stroking Alo’s ego now that she’s about to take the home run title from her. Alo’s reputation as a masher from Hawaii preceded her long before she got to Norman.

“It's like it was almost like a fangirl moment too for me,” Chamberlain said of their meeting back in 2018, “because you hear so much about this kid coming out of Hawaii that's just destroying everything in college softball. So I'm like, ‘Alright, let's see what you got.’ ”

Alo had actually hit a home run in her first college game — of course — against Weber State. She homered twice that weekend at the Grand Canyon University Kickoff Tournament in Phoenix and, although she was still 94 dingers away from owning the mark, she might as well have been breathing down Chamberlain’s neck.

“When I got to college and just started taking off,” Alo said, “I was like, ‘OK, like, let's do it.’ ”

Her confidence stemmed from the work she put in, as well as the daily reinforcement she got from her dad, Levi, that greatness awaits.

“I told my dad the other day,” Alo said, “ … He believed in me from when I was at a young age, and just he just kind of instilled that in my head for a while. And then I started to believe it, and then I got here and now it's actually happening.”

Not that Alo doesn’t go through moments of self-doubt. She’s human, after all.

But Gasso said Alo’s ability to dream it and do it is rare.

“Jocy puts her mind to something, she's gonna do it,” Gasso said. “It's really unique for someone her age. I mean, she was doing that back in high school when she's wrestling — in high school — and saying, ‘I’m going to do (this),” you know, and she wins a state championship by dislocating the other girl's arm to do it. And not that she was planning that, but she knew she was going to be the champion wrestler. She really does put her mind to things.”

“When she gets her mind set on it, she gets it done,” Gasso said. “ ‘I did start from a young age,’ and I think it was the underdog (mentality) — ‘Kids from Hawaii don't do this on the big stage. I'm going to be the first female that people know my name.’

“And here we are … five years later.”