Oklahoma softball: Sooner pitching shuts out Kansas, times three
By Chip Rouse
It was an epic weekend for the No. 2-ranked Oklahoma softball team. Not only did the Sooners record three consecutive shutouts over Kansas, but they limited the Jayhawks to just five total hits the entire weekend.
The story of the weekend was the remarkable performance of the Oklahoma pitching staff. Three Sooner pitchers worked a total of 19 innings against Kansas, allowing no runs, five hits and striking out 29 Jayhawk batters. Giselle Juarez, Mariah Lopez and Shannon Saile completely shut down the Jayhawk offense as the Sooners swept the three-game series at Kansas by the combined score of 23-0
Juarez got Oklahoma off to a great start, throwing a masterful one-hit, 10-0 run-rule shutout in Friday’s opening game. It was the junior transfer from Arizona State’s 16th win of the season without a defeat. She struck out 11 of the 20 batters she faced.
Senior second baseman Caleigh Clifton hit her 11th home run of the season and freshman Grace Green contributed another fence-clearing blast, accounting for four of the Sooners’ 10 runs on Friday.
The Sooners (38-2, 9-0) clinched the series win with a 5-0 victory on Saturday, with Lopez duplicating the one-hit performance by her teammate the day before. Oklahoma managed just five hits of its own, two of those by senior third baseman Sydney Romero, who leads OU and the Big 12 with a .458 batting average.
Oklahoma unloaded the big bats on Sunday, with four Sooners clearing the fences in a 8-0 OU victory. Meanwhile, Saile, who transferred to OU after two seasons at Florida International, shut down the Jayhawks on three hits and no runs over four innings, earning her eighth win of the season in nine decisions. Lopez came on in relief and pitched a perfect fifth inning and Juarez finished out the victory with a one-two-three sixth.
The Sooners scored three runs in the first inning on Sunday on a home run by Clifton. Green hit a solo blast in the fifth inning, and OU added four insurance runs in the sixth on Romero’s league-leading 15th home run of the season and a second home run in the game by Green.
The series sweep extends Oklahoma’s consecutive win streak to 28 games — the longest active streak in Division I softball and fourth longest in program history — and 34 consecutive wins over Big 12 opponents.
The two run-rule victories over Kansas gives the Sooners 21 in 40 games this season. Nineteen of the Oklahoma wins this season have been by shutout.
The Sooners are off until this weekend, when they continue their 11-game road junket with three games at Texas.