Oklahoma's Grace Lyons Lands Big 12 Honor

Last year's Big 12 defensive player of the year hit four home runs against Texas Tech and raised her season total to 17.

As the No. 1-ranked Sooners improved to 36-0 — the best start in NCAA softball history — Lyons was one of the offensive catalysts.

Lyons, a senior from Peoria, AZ, batted .600 with four home runs, five RBIs and nine runs scored. She reset her single-season career-high for home runs with 17 by hitting at least one in all three games at Texas Tech. Lyons was the 2021 Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year and now has her first Big 12 weekly accolade.

Lyons also walked twice and didn’t strike out against the Red Raiders as the Sooners roared to wins of 11-0, 11-0 and 21-0.

The Sooners visit Texas (30-10) for a key three-game Big 12 series in Austin this weekend, with the first game on Thursday.


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John E. Hoover
JOHN E. HOOVER

John is an award-winning journalist whose work spans five decades in Oklahoma, with multiple state, regional and national awards as a sportswriter at various newspapers. During his newspaper career, John covered the Dallas Cowboys, the Kansas City Chiefs, the Oklahoma Sooners, the Oklahoma State Cowboys, the Arkansas Razorbacks and much more. In 2016, John changed careers, migrating into radio and launching a YouTube channel, and has built a successful independent media company, DanCam Media. From there, John has written under the banners of Sporting News, Sports Illustrated, Fan Nation and a handful of local and national magazines while hosting daily sports talk radio shows in Oklahoma City, Tulsa and statewide. John has also spoken on Capitol Hill in Oklahoma City in a successful effort to put more certified athletic trainers in Oklahoma public high schools. Among the dozens of awards he has won, John most cherishes his national "Beat Writer of the Year" from the Associated Press Sports Editors, Oklahoma's "Best Sports Column" from the Society of Professional Journalists, and Two "Excellence in Sports Medicine Reporting" Awards from the National Athletic Trainers Association. John holds a bachelor's degree in Mass Communications from East Central University in Ada, OK. Born and raised in North Pole, Alaska, John played football and wrote for the school paper at Ada High School in Ada, OK. He enjoys books, movies and travel, and lives in Broken Arrow, OK, with his wife and two kids.