We love championships, and for two years in a row, the Michigan softball team has won the Big Ten tournament title.

The star of the show, Lauren Dirkowski, pitcher, and most outstanding player, both last year and this year in a large part of why Michigan came away, defeating UCLA in that championship game.

She joins me next on Conquering Heroes.

Welcome to your one-stop podcast for all things Michigan Athletics.

Updates on every team on campus and interviews with players and coaches are all on the way.

This is Conquering Heroes.

Here's your host, John Jansen. I'm now joined by the reigning two-time most outstanding player

in the Big Ten tournament for women's softball. Lauren Dukowski, Lauren, thanks for joining me,

and how'd you have the repeat performance year after year?

Yeah, thanks for having me on.

I'm excited to be here and chat with you guys.

I think just going out there and having full belief in this team and in Aaron having my back

on the mound, I was able to just throw my pitches and get outs for us when we

needed them. You had, obviously last year, you guys won it and you were most outstanding

player this year. How much more difficult is it year after year when you go in, maybe you're not

the top seed, but people know that you can rise to the occasion, whether as an individual or as a team.

Yeah, I've always said, like, I think the tournament's so fun because it is such a clean slate for

everyone and you go in and it's zero, zero and you know, you're bringing your best and they're

bringing their best because it's winner go home. So you kind of go out there, just believing in your team, believing that you can get

the job done.

And I think that this year we did exactly that.

And it was just a pretty great feeling overall.

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