Patty Gasso walks back viral 'bleeding hands' quote that fired up fans and former players

After a few days to think about it and let emotions settle, Oklahoma head coach Patty Gasso admitted she might have overreacted during her press conference after the Sooners squandered a five-run lead to get upset by Georgia in the quarterfinals of the SEC Softball Tournament last week. However, many OU fans and even Gasso's former players would disagree and were fired up about what they heard from the program's leader.

The Sooners were up 5-0 in their first game of the conference tournament before giving up the biggest comeback in SEC Softball Tournament history as the Bulldogs scored 10 unanswered runs to upset OU 10-5. Less than two weeks before, the Sooners swept Georgia in a three-game series, so Gasso had every right to be fired up about the failure and let her team have it afterward.

Patty Gasso admits emotions got the best of her after Oklahoma's SEC Softball Tournament loss

Gasso this week, though, was a guest on College Sports on SiriusXM leading up to the start of the NCAA Softball Championship and had a different tone.

"I think I overreacted a little bit at the end of our game, talking about making players' hands bleed, which is really just my emotions speaking," Gasso said. "But did I have an amount of alumni sending me, like, 'It's about time. Finally you're gonna be tough again,' you know, all of that.

"It just doesn't work. It just doesn't work that way. So I went back and talked with the team yesterday, and we just kind of reset and we talked about it. We have a pretty good plan going forward."

Here's the viral quote Gasso referenced: "I think we all had a conversation and decided to go back to Norman and just practice harder, do things sharper -- like clean up practice instead of going through the motions like we've got it. Let's really, really press. We’re gonna press you everyday throughout the entire practice to the point of exhaustion. And you should keep asking for more. And more and more and more. Until your hands bleed.

"That’s the mentality that we want our players to have instead of, like, 'Oh, we're good. We're good.' No, we're not good. And we showed that. And so that is going to be our approach is we're going back and we are going to work as hard as we ever have in a short window to have ourselves prepared for a home regional."

Read more: Patty Gasso sends Oklahoma a ruthless message after SEC Softball Tournament collapse

The quote quickly spread all over social media and was written about by outlets who cover the Sooners. The quote didn't go viral for the wrong reasons, though.

Gasso revealed her former players, back before coaches had to worry about athletes transferring, were pumped to hear those words from her, and so were OU fans in hopes it would light a fire under the team during the most crucial part of the season. It might not work in today's college sports with the Transfer Portal and NIL, but it's how every other athlete, no matter the level, used to be coached.

Teams sometimes need a reality check and that almost always has to come from a coach after a brutal loss. Gasso might not have been thinking clearly because of emotions, but it was also her instincts of what needed to be said after 31 seasons leading the Sooners, including eight national titles.

Despite the disappointing conference tournament, the Sooners earned the third overall seed in the NCAA Softball Championship and will host Kansas, Michigan and Binghampton this weekend in the Norman Regional after, no matter what Gasso admits, was an eye-opening week for her team.

"We had some conversation, but a lot of good, hard practice," Gasso said. "No bleeding hands, but hard practice."

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