• The Texas Longhorns women’s soccer team continues an improbable run toward the SEC championship game.
• In a tournament full of surprises and upsets, the No. 9-seeded Texas Longhorns have already dashed the hopes of No. 8-seeded Mississippi State, No. 5-seeded Arkansas, and No. 1-ranked Vanderbilt.
• They will play the South Carolina Gamecocks in the Final on Sunday, Nov. 15, at 2:30 pm.

The 2026 SEC women's soccer tournament has been full of surprises and upsets. None, however, have been bigger than the historic run of the ninth-seeded Texas Longhorns.

After entering the tournament as one of the lowest seeds in the field, the Longhorns have battled their way to Sunday's championship game, becoming the lowest-seeded team in conference history to reach the final. The last hurdle between Texas and the title is the tournament’s No. 2-seeded and the No. 11-ranked team in the country, South Carolina. The Longhorns will hope to repeat their performance in 2024 when they defeated the Gamecocks to win SEC championship.

Though Texas won this decisive match two years ago, the team’s path to the final this year has been anything but straightforward. They opened the tournament by defeating No. 8-seeded Mississippi State in a penalty shootout before pulling off the tournament's biggest upset, beating the No. 1-ranked Vanderbilt 2-1 in the quarterfinals.

The Vanderbilt Commodores entered the SEC tournament with a 16-0-1 record. They are just the second SEC team to finish the regular season undefeated since the conference introduced women’s soccer in 1993.

But that didn’t scare the Longhorns. Texas’ Caroline Swann opened the scoring early in that quarterfinals match, and Ava McDonald doubled the Longhorns’ lead before the half. Although Vanderbilt pulled one goal back, Texas hung on for the victory and earned its first win over a No. 1-ranked opponent in program history.

The Longhorns didn’t stop there. They carried that momentum into Thursday’s semifinals, where they beat No. 5-seeded Arkansas. Once again, however, it wasn't an easy win. Texas scored first and benefited from an Arkansas own goal, but Arkansas leveled the score twice to send the match beyond overtime into a penalty-kick shootout.

In that shootout, Longhorn goalkeeper Annis-Clara Wright made two big saves, and McDonald delivered the decisive penalty kick, clinching Texas’s path to the SEC championships.

"I feel like we're giving the 'Little Engine That Could' energy right now," said head coach Margueritte Bates after the game. "It all goes back to the players buying into what we've been doing … I'm a real big believer that when times get tough, you don't rise to the occasion, but you fall back on your training.”

“I'm really proud of how we've handled ourselves in the high-pressure moments and responded to adversity,” Bates continued. “We gave up the lead with less than five minutes left and they really dug in."

Texas, undoubtedly the tournament’s Cinderella story, will face South Carolina in the finals, a team that has followed a more conventional path to get here. After a bye in the first round, the No. 2 Gamecocks defeated No. 10 Georgia 3-0 in the quarterfinals and then defeated No. 3 Alabama 2-1 in the semis. Though the latter game had its tough moments — Alabama did get on the board, after all — South Carolina held on to secure its third SEC championship appearance in five seasons.

While South Carolina enters Sunday’s championship game with a better record and higher seed, Texas has demonstrated they should not be underestimated. A win on Sunday for South Carolina would reinforce the program’s standing at the top of the conference; a win for Texas would be the culmination of a historic underdog run.

The game kicks off on Sunday, Nov. 15, at 2:30 pm.