Oklahoma State baseball selected as No. 11 seed for NCAA Tournament, will open vs. Oral Roberts
STILLWATER — As soon as college baseball’s NCAA Tournament selection show ended late Monday morning, Oklahoma State coach Josh Holliday had an important announcement for his team.
“Get your laundry in,” Holliday’s speech began, continuing with talking points about organizing lockers and resting their bodies on Memorial Day.
The Cowboys (41-17) earned the No. 11 seed in the bracket that includes a couple of familiar opponents, Oral Roberts and Dallas Baptist, as well as Washington to fill out the four-team, double-elimination regional this weekend at O’Brate Stadium. The Cowboys face ORU at 6 p.m. Friday, following the noon opener between Dallas Baptist and Washington.
But on Monday morning, Holliday wasn’t ready to discuss opponents with his players. He wanted them to get settled back into life at home after playing the last nine games over a 15-day span on the road.
“We’ve been on the road a lot,” Holliday told the media after dismissing his players from the video room inside O’Brate Stadium.
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As excited as he is to have his team back home for a week, Holliday is also curious to see how the recent string of bus trips and hotel nights have added to his team’s chemistry.
“In some ways, it’s been wonderful,” said Holliday, who earned his 400th career coaching victory over the weekend. “It’s brought us very much closer together. I think back to some of the bus rides and some of the fun we’ve had together, hotel time and meals and moments.
“I’ve seen teams galvanize and come together, and on other occasions it can break a team down, but this team has handled it wonderfully. We’ve had a lot of fun together. We’ve built a lot of momentum and some joy in that experience, so I think it’s been a blessing for us to have taken on that stretch.”
Rolling up 18 wins in the last 23 games, the Cowboys finished in a tie for the Big 12 regular-season title, and were runners-up in the conference tournament, providing a strong boost late in the season to strengthen the tournament résumé.
Seeking their first College World Series trip since 2016, the Cowboys learned on Sunday they had been selected as one of the 16 regional hosts, but Monday’s drama was in the seeding. As the selection show ran on with no OSU announcement, it reached a point where the Cowboys realized they’d be either No. 11 or No. 14.
When it neared time for the 11th seed reveal, players grew anxious, with several yelling “Stillwater!” at the screen just before it showed up.
“It is nice to get to spend some time back in Stillwater, get to sleep in our own beds,” said pitcher Ben Abram, who transferred from OU prior to the season. “It’s a great experience to have this at home. I’ve only been in one regional before. Having a chance to host one… everyone’s excited and looking forward to it.”
The Stillwater Regional winner will align with the winner from the Nashville Regional, hosted by sixth-seeded Vanderbilt for the best-of-three super-regional to earn a berth in the College World Series.
As thrilling as it was to see their name called as the No. 11 seed, The Cowboys’ buzz was killed a bit when a couple of familiar foes popped up on the screen in the bracket.
ORU beat the Cowboys in both regular-season meetings, and the Pokes split with Dallas Baptist in the most opposite of ways. OSU won 20-4 on March 14 and lost 8-0 two weeks later.
All four games, however, were played on Tuesday nights, so the increased intensity of a regional will change the dynamics.
“Those games were played mid-week, so you see each team’s mid-week pitching alignment, and in this particular situation, you’ll see their weekend pitching alignment, which is a little different,” Holliday said. “We’ll start lining up our game plan.”
Holliday went deep into his pitching staff on Saturday and Sunday, getting creative with how he managed his regulars so as to limit their pitches, while also getting innings from pitchers who rarely — if ever — see the mound.
Riley Taylor, a senior walk-on who had never appeared in a game in his career, threw the final two innings of the 12-5 loss to TCU on Sunday. Juaron Watts-Brown, one of the team’s regular starters, only appeared out of the bullpen on two occasions. Abram pitched six innings on Friday and came back to throw two more on Sunday.
But because of the way they were used, Holliday should have his primary starters fully rested for the weekend.
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“I know I’ll be back to normal tomorrow,” Abram said on Monday, admitting his arm was a bit sore after throwing 13 innings in a seven-day span. “I think I recover pretty good. It helps when you don’t throw 100.
“That was a really good weekend for the staff. I think we came a long way. A lot of guys grew up. A lot of guys showed flashes of more stuff than we’ve had throughout the season. It feels like stuff is starting to click. And if that’s the case, I think we’re in a really good place.”
The Cowboys, of course, have relied on their offense to get them to this point, but pitchers’ showing at the Big 12 Tournament came with a boost of confidence throughout the dugout.
“There’s gonna be no more challenges that we haven’t faced before,” sophomore second baseman Roc Riggio said. “We’ve seen it all. We’ve played double-headers. We’ve played eight-hour days on the field. We’ve gone places and played the best teams in the country. We’ve played in front of 30,000 fans.
“I don’t think there’s a challenge that’ll come that we haven’t faced yet. We’ve seen the best of the best and I think we’re real prepared for what’s ahead.”
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Stillwater Regional
Friday's games at O'Brate Stadium:
● Washington (34-18) vs. Dallas Baptist (45-14), noon (ESPN+)
● No. 11 Oklahoma State (41-18) vs. Oral Roberts (46-11), 6 p.m. (ESPN+)
NCAA baseball regional hosts
1. Wake Forest (47-10)
2. Florida (44-14)
3. Arkansas (41-16)
4. Clemson (43-17)
5. LSU (43-15)
6. Vanderbilt (41-18)
7. Virginia (45-12)
8. Stanford (38-16)
9. Miami (40-19)
10. Coastal Carolina (39-19)
11. Oklahoma State (41-17)
12. Kentucky (36-18)
13. Auburn (34-21-1)
14. Indiana State (42-15)
15. South Carolina (39-19)
16. Alabama (40-19)
OSU baseball season ticket holders can reserve their seats before Wednesday. The remaining tickets will go on sale at 10 a.m. Wednesday and can be purchased online at tickets.okstate.com/baseball/ or by calling the OSU ticket office at 877-255-4678.
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Printable NCAA baseball tournament bracket
This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Oklahoma State baseball: NCAA Tournament Stillwater Regional times, TV
