Oklahoma softball: Sooners are down but don’t count them out

Oklahoma softball entered the 2018 Women’s College World Series with just three losses in 58 games this season.

The Sooners’ 2-0 loss to Washington in the opening round of the WCWS on Thursday was their fourth this season, still the fewest of any of the eight teams in the championship double-elimination tournament. Teams in the Pac-12 Conference, which has four teams in this year’s WCWS, have been responsible for three of the four losses (Arizona, Oregon and Washington), and all three have been by shutout.

The fact that the loss came at ASA Hall of Fame Stadium in Oklahoma City, where three weeks ago Oklahoma won its seventh consecutive Big 12 Championship, is a little surprising. What isn’t as surprising is that the Sooners lost to a team that, in many ways, mirrored the way Oklahoma has played all season and is the predominant reason they have won 58 of 62 games.

The Washington pitching was superior to Oklahoma’s on this day, and the Huskie hitters were better able to capitalize on scoring opportunities than the deep and talented Sooner lineup. Oklahoma leads the nation in scoring this season, averaging close to seven runs a game.

On Thursday afternoon, however, a pair of Washington pitchers shut down the typically potent Oklahoma bats and shut out the Sooners on the scoreboard, something that has happened only before to an OU team in its WCWS history.

The Sooners hitters managed to hit just three balls out of the infield in the first five innings on Thursday, and no OU player reached second base until the sixth inning. It wasn’t as though the Sooners were waving at and missing the ball of being called out on strikes. They were making good contact and hitting the ball hard, but in most cases right at a Washington fielder. The Huskie infielders were virtually flawless, time after time coming up with spectacular plays on hard-hit ground balls.

Oklahoma has the best fieldling percentage in the country and has committed the fewest errors, but it was the Washington defense that stood out in Thursday’s opening round.

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The Sooners now must work there way through the losers’ bracket if they want to win a third consecutive national championship. First up on that off-road journey is Arizona State, which Oklahoma defeated 7-2 back in late February in the Mary Nutter Collegiate Classic in Palm Springs, California.

If OU is successful in getting past No. 8 seed Arizona State on Saturday morning, the Sooners will play again on Saturday, in the early game of the evening session, against the loser of the Friday night contest between No. 2 Florida and No. 3 UCLA.

In order to avoid elimination and make it through the losers’ bracket and into the championship series, beginning on Monday, Oklahoma will have to play two games on both Saturday and Sunday and win against higher-seeded teams. Clearly not an easy task, but not an impossible one, either

The last three times Oklahoma won the national championship, it did not lose its opening-round WCWS game. In 11 previous WCWS appearances, the Sooners have lost in the opening round just four times. On all four occasions, Oklahoma did not make it further than three games.

This is another season, however, and this team is different than those other Sooner softball teams. Head coach Patty Gasso, who has won four national championships at Oklahoma, calls this OU squad the most resilient of all the Sooner  teams she has coached. They have had their backs to the wall before and come out fighting and in the winner’s circle.

In order to play for a third consecutive national championship, the Sooners will have to do just that, four more times at least. If any team is capable of successfully climbing that steep mountain, it is this group of championship-minded Sooners.