Major softball tournament brings top-tier young talent to Kansas City this week

More than 300 softball teams will arrive in Kansas City this week, vying for championship titles and the eyes of college recruiters.

From Thursday through Sunday, they’re set to compete in the Top Gun Invitational, an elite tournament and college showcase established in 2013 by Top Gun Events co-founders Jeremy McDowell and Robb Behymer.

Games will be played at the Blue Valley Recreation Center in Overland Park; Mid-America Sports Complex in Shawnee; Legacy Park in Lee’s Summit; Markey Park in Belton; Central Bank Sporting Complex at Line Creek in KCMO; and Baker University and the Baldwin City Sports Complex in Baldwin City, Kan.

The Invitational, now in its 11th year, unfolds amid a time of an undeniable momentum in the development and fandom of women’s sports — especially in Kansas City, which saw the opening of the world’s first stadium dedicated to a professional women’s team earlier this year.

It seems that Kansas City can be known as more than a soccer city when it comes to sports — especially women’s sports.

“There are very few cities in the United States that will ever get to experience what Kansas City will experience for the sport of softball next week,” McDowell said.

The Top Gun Invitational began with a relatively humble lineup of 80 teams from 10 states. This year, players from the U12 to U18 levels abound from hometowns both nearby and far-flung.

This year, 32 U.S. states will be represented. Teams traveling the longest to get here will journey nearly 4,000 miles, flying across the Pacific Ocean from Hawaii.

In a sense, the competition began even before the flights were booked. In order to participate, each team went through an application process — the showcase’s selection committee seeks only the best squads.

According to McDowell, the Top Gun Invitational is one of the three most attractive college softball-recruiting opportunities in the nation. And it might just be the top softball tournament in the country: More than 350 coaches will be watching from the stands, scouting for the futures of their programs.

Paige Crawford, Top Gun’s director of athlete experience, spoke to the opportunities these numbers represent in a recent podcast: “The reach that these girls, these athletes, can get with coaches and schools and programs is astronomical compared to when I was growing up,” Crawford said.

Crawford grew up playing softball in Salina, Kansas, eventually reaching the collegiate level at Hawaii Pacific University.

“When I see an athlete that has a lot of promising talent, I just look at it with admiration because the world is their oyster in this day and age.” she said.

The financial investment is certainly there. According to an economic report by Destinations International, the Top Gun Invitational is estimated to bring in a total of about $5.5 million in direct business sales over the course of the weekend.

All this, of course, will play out with plenty of room for the landscape of American softball to grow. While this week’s invitational looms on the near horizon, McDowell also has his sights on the future.

“I think where we are,” he said, “is we’ve got to figure out how we can get support for TV rights and eyeballs and butts in seats, so that we can grow a professional league (and) these young ladies don’t have to stop playing, necessarily, at the end of college.”

A growing game, thousands of eyes, young athletes driven to prove themselves ... and in three more days, the very first pitch.