OU softball loses at Texas as Longhorns snap Sooners' 40-game Big 12 win streak

AUSTIN, Texas — Patty Gasso said there was no doubt in her mind.

When OU’s Rylie Boone laced the ball over Texas center fielder Kayden Henry’s head, the Sooners coach was waving freshman Maya Bland home.

“They have to make a perfect relay,” Gasso said.

Unfortunately for Gasso and the Sooners, the Longhorns made that relay, cutting down Bland at the plate as Texas snapped OU’s 17-game winning streak with a 2-1 win on Saturday in front of a program-record crowd at Red & Charline McCombs Field.

The Sooners have come out on both ends of the new obstruction rule, which gives the catcher more leeway to move to meet the throw.

The throw from shortstop Viviana Martinez took catcher Reese Atwood up the third-base line to meet Bland, setting off a celebration from the Longhorns crowd as home plate umpire Robert Gonzalez called Bland out.

Atwood spiked the ball as the Longhorns celebrated near the circle.

Gasso challenged the play but after several looks, the call was upheld, setting off another celebration.

Even 20 or so minutes after the game, sitting in the Texas team meeting room, Gasso could hear lingering celebrations from the nearby Longhorns.

“To be quite honest with you, I feel honored that teams are so excited when they beat us,” Gasso said. “It’s just an honor.”

After getting three hits off Longhorns’ starter Citlaly Gutierrez in the first to take a 1-0 lead, the Sooners’ bats went silent.

OU managed just one hit from the second through sixth innings before coming alive in the seventh with two outs.

Kinzie Hansen singled up the middle before giving way to Bland as a pinch runner.

Then Boone followed by lacing Gutierrez’s 0-1 pitch to deep center to start the game-deciding play.

“Paige Bueckers said it first, you don’t win or lose on the last play of the game,” Tiare Jennings said. “We had many opportunities and we just didn’t take advantage of it.”

The loss snapped the Sooners’ 40-game Big 12 winning streak.

Now, OU (35-2, 13-1) will try to avoid losing their first conference series since 2011 or their first back-to-back losses since February 2020.

“We didn’t make adjustments fast enough, which is very uncharacteristic for our lineup, so we are definitely reaping the consequences of that,” Hansen said. “But I’m excited to see what it looks like going forward because whenever this does happen, our adjustments are much more efficient.”

Here are three more takeaways from the Sooners’ loss:

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Sooners stifled by early mistake

OU had a chance to break through for more in the first inning against Gutierrez.

After Kasidi Pickering doubled to left to give OU runners at second and third with two outs, Jennings dumped a single into short right center to score Brito.

Pickering froze on the play, not advancing until the ball dropped despite there being two outs.

“A freshman who froze,” Gasso said. “There were two outs, she should be moving. We talked about it. And those are the wonderful things that we’re experiencing is high-energy crowds, big moments, and these freshmen need to feel that, so that will never happen again.

“But that did hurt us a bit.”

After Jennings’ single, Alynah Torres grounded out to end the inning and leave Pickering stranded.

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Leaving early rule continues to be a factor

For the second consecutive game, the new adjustment to the rule regarding runners leaving early played a major factor.

In the sixth, Katie Stewart got McCombs Field rocking with an apparent bases-loaded two-run double with no outs that would’ve put the Longhorns ahead 4-1 and left them threatening more damage.

But Gasso quickly asked for a review and shortly thereafter, the double was wiped off the board.

Victoria Hunter, who had come around to score on the play from second, was ruled to have left early, giving the Longhorns runners on the corners with one out instead.

Karlie Keeney got Stewart to instead pop out to shortstop, then after a walk loaded the bases again, Keeney got Katie Cimusz to ground out to end the threat and keep the Sooners within one.

Both coaches said they weren’t big fans of the rule and the way it is being applied.

“Do I love it? No, because I do think it’s taking away from the excitement of the game,” Gasso said. “But it is what it is. What I would like to see if you ask for a review and you get it overturned, you get that review back.”

Texas coach Mike White was on the rules committee.

“So I guess I can blame myself,” White said. “But the purpose of the rule was to stop people leaving early on steals and now it’s become like more intertwined with base hits, home runs, doubles. And it’s very close because from what I understand, it’s so close, like millimeters or centimeters within leaving or now. So close you can’t see it by eye. That’s why it’s not being called by the umpires.”

Gasso said it was like having an extra umpire on the field.

“This game is all about adjustments,” Hansen, who was called out for leaving early in Friday’s opener, said. “The game keeps growing. New rules, new this and that. So it’s all about adjusting. It’s all about training. We’ve trained our whole lives (to) kind of leave when the pitcher is at 12 o’clock or kind of back here. So it’s an adjustment.”

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Jayda Coleman keeps streak alive

It didn’t take Jayda Coleman long to extend her hitting streak Saturday.

The Sooners’ senior center fielder hit Citlaly Guttierrez’s first pitch of the game into short left-center to extend her hitting streak to seven.

Coleman finished 1 for 3.

She came up in the fifth with a runner on first and two outs and hit a hard liner into deep center, but it was tracked down by Texas’ Kayden Henry to end the inning.

During her hitting streak, Coleman is 12 for 20 (.600) with 10 RBIs, 13 runs and five home runs.

Coleman was on deck when Boone belted her double.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: OU softball loses at Texas as Sooners' 40-game Big 12 win streak ends