Alyssa HaduckMultiple AuthorsMay 12, 2026, 07:00 AM ET
IT’S APRIL, IN the closing stretch of the regular season for the Belmont softball team, and Maya Johnson is striding toward the dugout, her cleats crunching along the rust-colored, gravel warning track lining the perimeter of the field. As the rest of the team begins Thursday morning practice, she approaches the Bruins’ pitching corps, gathered near first base.
“Strut, Maya,” pitching coach Emlyn Knerem jokes. Johnson bashfully raises a hand to stop the teasing. “You do strut when you’re out there,” Knerem says, throwing a thumb over her shoulder in the direction of the pitcher’s mound.
And it’s a title she has earned. Over the past two seasons, Johnson has established herself as one of the best pitchers in college softball. With an unbeatable .66 earned run average and 381 strikeouts, the Bruins’ redshirt senior sits atop the NCAA in nearly every pitching category.
In April, Johnson made an unexpected appearance in the Bruins’ 11-10 slugfest against local rival, Lipscomb University. As the runs multiplied, she started asking head coach Laura Matthews to put her on the mound, knowing she could clinch the late-season win.
In the top of the seventh, Belmont secured a one-run lead. Matthews agreed to let Johnson close, on one condition: no throwing at practice the next day. Johnson agreed, then struck out the next three Bison batters for the win.
This morning, Johnson has remained true to her word. As the Bruins’ fielders execute a fast-paced defensive drill, pitcher and coach watch from the first-base line. Both understand that for Johnson, rest is often more valuable than reps.
After years of trial and error with various treatments, Johnson had finally found a balance that kept her lupus symptoms at bay. Then, the unpredictable disease dealt her her most difficult challenge yet, threatening her future on the field. But she has always believed in her ability to beat any opponent.
JOHNSON SITS, LEGS extended, on a padded table in the Bruins’ training room. The softball team’s athletic trainer, Brie Ashauer, guides an ultrasound probe around Johnson’s left shoulder as electrical stimulation pads send pulses to her muscles. Together, the treatments aid in recovery.
Lupus slows the body’s healing processes, so Ashauer must conduct treatments at lower settings, and with higher frequency, to ensure Johnson is fit to play. In addition to taking medications, Johnson also wears a continuous glucose monitor to track her blood sugar levels.
Today, Johnson has symptom management down to a science. But before her diagnosis, she struggled against the effects of the disease.
Johnson was in seventh grade when she began feeling overwhelmed by exhaustion. Since beginning mixed martial arts at age 6, and softball at 9, she had become accustomed to the demands of life as an athlete. This feeling, though, was different. Sometimes, she’d sleep up to 16 hours a day. Most of her lab work would come back with the slightest abnormalities, discouraging doctors from offering any formal diagnoses.
But by freshman year of high school, Johnson’s health had gotten worse. Her joints were swollen, and it hurt to walk. She tried to keep up with softball training, but would often miss practices and games to rest.
“I genuinely felt crazy,” Johnson said. “I was like, ‘I have all these symptoms. I’m exhausted all the time. I’m not being believed something’s wrong.'”
For three years, Johnson visited various specialists, but none could put a name to her condition. In the fall of 2018, she met with a rheumatologist for yet another opinion. A few days later, she was diagnosed with lupus.
“No one wants a life-altering diagnosis, or a lifelong diagnosis,” Johnson said. “But it was really, honestly, relieving to finally put a name to what I was experiencing, because it’s like, ‘Okay, we have a foundation. Where do we go from here?'”
In December of her junior year, however, she experienced a lupus flare-up, when the disease is triggered back into action by stress, infection or exhaustion. This time, it manifested neurologically, causing confusion, grogginess and headaches. Johnson spent nearly two weeks in the hospital before doctors could bring her lupus back to its baseline. But by softball season, she was ready to compete and led her high school team to its first district championship final in program history.
“There were times where it was like, ‘Okay, let’s pause for a week or two and adjust this, and then you can go back,'” Johnson said of conversations with her physicians. “But it was never, ‘You should quit softball altogether.'”
WHEN THE CLOCK hit midnight on August 31, 2019, Johnson received a flood of texts and emails. It was the beginning of her junior year of high school, and college coaches could now officially begin recruiting her.
“She looked me dead in the eyes, she said, ‘That’s great, but they don’t know what it’s like to be a Division I athlete. I’m still not going to clear you,'” Johnson said.
The physician’s outlook, however, hadn’t changed. Johnson said she was told she’d likely never be cleared to play. Instead, she could medically disqualify herself from competing in NCAA softball while retaining her scholarship.
“I never had the self-doubt. But to have factors outside of my control [keep me from playing], fully knowing I’m capable, was a really, really dark place to be in,” she said. “I was really depressed my second semester at Pitt. And even while I was depressed, I knew I was going to find a way.”
LAURA MATTHEWS WAS leading the softball program at Wright State University when she first learned of a young pitcher named Maya Johnson.
Instead, Johnson committed to the team at Bowling Green State University, which had agreed to clear her for competition. But two weeks later, the coach who recruited her left the program for an opportunity at Bradley University. Johnson had hoped to follow, but was once again denied approval to play. She returned to the portal, determined to find a fit.
Matthews, too, was undeterred. She reached out to Johnson a third time, unaware that other programs were turning the pitcher away because of her health. Rather, after learning how Johnson had been managing her lupus over the past several years, Matthews was even more convinced she wanted her on her team.
“This kid’s smart and she’s got it together,” Matthews remembered thinking. “She’s never failed at anything before. Why would she fail at this now?”
Matthews advocated for Johnson in conversations with Belmont physicians and healthcare partners. The group ultimately granted its approval. This time, when Matthews invited Johnson to join the team, she said yes.
As a redshirt freshman, Johnson dedicated herself to discrediting her doubters. The following season, she had a 1.49 earned run average. As a redshirt junior, she recorded 366 strikeouts, including 11 shutouts, making her one of few mid-major players to earn All-America honors.
“If I believe in myself, the people around me believe in me, and it’s reflected on the field,” she said. “Why shouldn’t you be scared of me?”
IN MAY 2025, under the central Iowa sun, Johnson rushed off the mound and into an embrace with catcher Brenna Blume. She had just thrown her 355th strikeout of the season to clinch the Missouri Valley conference championship title for the Bruins. The win earned them an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament, the first in program history.
But Belmont fell twice to Virginia Tech in the double-elimination regional round. And a few days later, the Bruins’ losses compounded when Johnson entered the transfer portal.
Her second transfer portal experience, however, came easier. She said she heard from more than 100 schools, including all but seven Power 4 programs. Her highest offer reached $380,000 — comprising name, image and likeness deals, revenue share payments, and various other agreements — in addition to a full scholarship.
After several weeks of searching for a new team, Johnson learned Belmont’s doctoral nursing program offered hybrid learning. Staying in Nashville to juggle softball and graduate studies was once again a possibility. So Johnson left the money in the portal and returned to Belmont.
“I was put exactly where I needed to be,” she said, “because I can’t imagine going through anything that happened to me this fall without my people here.”
In early October, routine lab work revealed Johnson’s lupus was weakening her kidneys. Another flare-up. To treat it, doctors told her she would need to begin cyclophosphamide infusions, a form of chemotherapy, the following week.
“I can’t lie around for months,” she told her physicians, “because when this works, I need to be ready for the season.”
So, on Friday afternoons, Johnson would spend three to four hours sitting for infusions at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center. The treatment would leave her physically, mentally and emotionally depleted. But on Mondays, she would force herself through team lift. By midweek, she would begin to feel like herself again. Yet Friday always arrived too soon.
“The cyclical nature of the ups and downs, of feeling bad and then feeling good, is really the thing that was the hardest,” she said.
When Johnson’s hair began to thin, she couldn’t deny the severity of her situation. If the chemotherapy didn’t work, there were a few other intensive treatments she could try. After that, dialysis, or a kidney transplant.
One Friday morning before leaving for treatment, Johnson sat in her car sobbing, dreading the hours ahead. In chemotherapy, her strength had met its match.
She texted Blume, who had become one of her closest friends over the past three seasons. Sensing trouble, Blume called her immediately.
For the first time, Johnson doubted herself. But Blume knew better. She told Johnson to take a deep breath. Then, she prayed.
“She’s a fighter,” Blume said. “And if anyone’s going to win, it’s going to be her. She’s going to beat it.”
And she did. On January 22, Johnson learned her lupus had stabilized; the chemotherapy had successfully stopped her immune system from attacking her kidneys. Twenty-one days after her final infusion, she took the mound for Belmont’s season opener against Missouri State — and pitched a perfect game.