The seventh was the easiest win so far for the Oklahoma baseball team.
The Sooners run-ruled Texas Southern 15-4 in seven innings on Tuesday evening at L. Dale Mitchell Park to continue their seven-game winning streak to start the season.
The offense exploded for seven runs in the second inning before adding 4, 3 and 1, respectively, the next three innings.
The offensive surge was a big benefit for sophomore righty Jacob Gholston, who made his first career start. He gave up four runs on six hits over five innings and was never in danger thanks to his lineup's early 7 spot in the second.
Reid Hensley finished the run-rule with a perfect final two innings.
The run-rule letting Johnson use just one reliever for 27 pitches with two less innings to maneuver was a big relief with the Sooners having five games this week. They play Texas Southern again Wednesday before hosting CSUN for a weekend series.
Now at 7-0, the Sooners are off to their best start since 2013, when OU began things 10-0. Under Sunny Golloway, that OU team finished 43-21 after losing to No. 1 LSU in Super Regionals.
Tuesday's win pushed these Sooners past OU's 6-0 start in 2019 under Johnson, making this the new best start under current leadership. This season and 2019 are the only times Johnson's teams even started a season with back-to-back wins. Johnson is 5-3 in season openers as OU's coach.
There's not much arguing, though, that this start is more impressive than both 2013 and 2019. Although they started 10-0, the 2013 Sooners didn't notch any top-25 wins during their run. The 2019 Sooners didn't either and lost to the first ranked opponent they came across -- No. 17 Cal State Fullerton.
Last weekend, OU tallied a pair of top-10 upsets at the Round Rock Classic in Texas with wins over then-No. 7 Oregon State and then-No. 2 Virginia. The 3-0 weekend catapulted the Sooners from unranked to No. 16 in this week's D1 Baseball Rankings.
The Sooners should improve to 8-0 within 24 hours after hosting Texas Southern again at 4 p.m. CT Wednesday.