Takeaways from No. 9-seeded Sooners' upset NCAA Regional loss to UConn

A little less than 24 hours after exploding for 14 runs on 17 hits in a win against Oral Roberts, the top-seeded Sooner baseball team found hits hard to come by and runs even more scarce as three-seeded UConn pulled off a 4-1 upset of Oklahoma in the NCAA Norman Regional.

The Sooners (38-20) had their ace on the mound in left-hander Braden Davis, who worked into the seventh inning, allowing just one run on six hits along with 10 strikeouts, but his OU teammates weren't able to muster any run support off of UConn starter Stephen Quigley

The Sooners hit the ball hard off of Quigley throughout the contest, but they weren't, as baseball legend Wee Willie Keeler famously said, "hitting 'em where they ain't."

After a scoreless first two innings, UConn scored a single run in the bottom of the third on a pair of walks and a single to take a 1-0 lead. That's the way things stood until the seventh inning. Davis got the first Huskie hitter to line out back to the mound, but that was followed by back-to-back singles, which ended Davis' night after 109 pitches.

UConn home run leader Luke Broadhurst promptly greeted the Sooners' Dylan Crooks out of the bullpen with a three-run blast over the left field fence. Just like that, it was a 4-0 game. Crooks struck out the next two batters, but the damage was already done.

Kendall Pettis launched a solo home run leading off the eighth to get the Sooners on the scoreboard, but that ended up being the final Oklahoma hit in the game and the only run.

In the category of what might have been, had it not been for UConn's three-run uprising the half inning before, Pettis' four-bagger might have tied the score, and who knows what might have happened after that.

Oh, well, "if ifs and buts were candy and nuts," as the saying goes...The unfortunate reality is that the Sooners now face an elimination game against the No. 2 regional seed, the Duke Blue Devils, on Sunday afternoon.

Takeaways from Oklahoma's loss to UConn in the Norman Regional

• OU starter Baden Davis (9-4) suffered his first loss in his last eight starts despite a gutsy performance. He allowed three runs on seven hits, struck out 10 with three walks. it was his third double-digit strikeout game this season.

• The first three hitters in the Sooners' starting lineup (John Spikerman, Bryce Madron and Easton Carmichael) went a combined 9 for 14 with eight runs batted in against Oral Roberts on Friday. Those same three players were 3 for 12 with no runs scored and no RBI in the loss to UConn.

• Oklahoma got doubles from Michael Snyder and John Spikerman in the fourth and fifth inning, respectively, but couldn't get them home.

• Sooner starter Davis and UConn starter Stephen Quigley both played for the Falmouth Commodores of the Cape Cod League last summer.

• If the Sooners are able to get past Duke on Sunday, they will face a rematch with UConn later in the Day. A win over UConn would force a winner-take-all championship game on Monday.