Oklahoma Baseball: Sooners’ Climb in Polls Slowed by Bedlam

Oklahoma baseball has spent over a month defying the experts, and with Big 12 play to commence this weekend, the Sooners are hoping the momentum they have built in winning 21 of 25 games will carry over into the conference schedule.

The Sooners, who began the season unranked and projected to finish sixth in the Big 12, have been steadily rising in the national polls, helped appreciably by being able to play 19 straight home games to begin the season and winning all but two of them. During that elongated home stand, Oklahoma reeled off 11 wins in a row at one stage.

Five games into a nine-day road trip, Oklahoma made a stopover in Stillwater, Okla., on Tuesday for the first of four regularly scheduled games against in-state rival Oklahoma State. After winning four of their first five games on the road trip, the Sooners stumbled in Stillwater, falling 4-3 and leaving the tying run on third base, 90-feet away.

The Loss dropped the 10th-ranked Sooners (in the most recent Collegiate Baseball News poll)for to 21-4 on the season, with a three-game road series with the Baylor Bears looming this weekend in the conference opener for Oklahoma.

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Oklahoma State jumped out in front early, taking a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the second inning on a solo home run by Colin Simpson, the OSU catcher. The Cowboys scored twice more an inning later and added a final run in the fourth, then snuffed out a Sooner rally in the top half of the ninth to preserve the victory.

Coming into Tuesday night’s contest with Oklahoma State. the Sooners had won six of the last 10 games.

Oklahoma outhit the Cowboys 10 to 7 and received two hits apiece from shortstop Brandon Zargoza, left fielder Steele Walker and catcher Renae Martinez. The Sooners also kicked themselves in the leg, leaving 10 runners on base.

The Sooners loaded the bases in the sixth inning but pushed just one run across, and threatened again in the top of the seventh, getting two men after two were out, but failed to score.

Oklahoma is off to one of its best starts in recent years. The Sooners lead the Big 12 in hitting and pitching.

Three OU position players -Martinez, Austin O’Brien and Brylie Ware – are in the top five in the league with batting averages above .360, and Walker is sixth with a .357 average through 25 games.

Starter Jake Irvin is 5-0 in the same number of starts with an earned run average of 1.16 and a league-leading 42 strikeouts. Opponents are hitting just .189 off of the Sooner right-hander.

Oklahoma visits Baylor (17-4) for a three-game set starting Friday. The Sooners are 6-7 against the Bears in the last four years and just 2-4 in games played in Waco.