Sooners hold off Oregon to advance to regional final
May 18—Oregon's Emma Kauf smacked a home run over the wall in right field to lead off the seventh inning. The next batter hit a ground ball up the middle of infield for a double allowing Katie Flanney to hit an RBI-single for the Ducks' third run in eight pitches.
As this was happening, Oklahoma head coach Patty Gasso was standing right next to Kelly Maxwell in the dugout. Gasso wanted to make sure Maxwell was ready in case she needed to re-enter the game.
She was ready.
"Coach always talks about staying locked in no matter the circumstance," Maxwell said.
After Oregon cut the Sooners' lead to 6-3, Gasso brought the Sooners' starter back into the game. Maxwell was dominant outside of a solo home run given up in the first inning of the Norman Regional on Saturday.
When Maxwell took back over in the circle in the seventh inning she struck out the first batter in five pitches. The next batter hit a ground ball right at the Sooners' pitcher.
Maxwell fired the ball to shortstop Tiare Jennings at second, who threw out the batter at first to complete the double play and secure the Sooners' win.
Oklahoma improved to 2-0 at its home regional with a 6-3 win over the Ducks in the winner's bracket. It now moves on to the regional final, where it needs to win one of its next two games in order to advance to super regionals.
"Kelly was superb," Gasso said. "I thought she got better as the game went on."
Maxwell gave up a home run on the second at-bat of the game and hit a batter in the second inning, but never let the Ducks gain any more momentum during that span. After hitting the batter in the second, she went on to retire the next 14 batters before being replaced by Karlie Keeney after six innings.
The Sooners' lead appeared to be safe at that point.
They responded to the early home run with two runs in the bottom of the first inning. Kasidi Pickering battled through a 12-pitch at-bat to score the Sooners' first run on a sacrifice fly ball.
Alyssa Brito hit an RBI single to give the Sooners a 2-1 lead after the first inning.
"Stick to the game plan," Jennings said. "just keep on fighting and keep on battling."
They only had two more hits over the next three innings. Gasso said the Sooners' coaching staff challenged the team and it seemed to make a difference.
Jennings scored two runs on a home run in the bottom of the fifth inning and Ella Parker put two more across with a home run in the sixth.
With a six-run lead, Gasso could've let Maxwell continue to stump the Ducks' hitters and pad her already impressive stats, but the Sooners' coach is always looking towards the future.
Karlie Keeney's stint in the circle didn't last long, but to Gasso it was still valuable.
"It's important that we give big-moment opportunities to some of our pitchers," she said. "So some people might go 'What are you doing?' and we know what we're doing. We have to do it.
"Although she didn't have a lot of success, we still believe in her."
Maxwell got credit for pitching seven full innings. She gave up just one home run with no other hits, no walks and one hit batter.
Maxwell also struck out eight of the 22 batters she faced and retired 17 straight batters to close out the Sooners' win.
"I know my team always has my back so I wasn't too worried when that happened in the first inning," Maxwell said. "I knew that I was kind of getting behind in counts and I wanted to flip that and get ahead."
The Ducks finished with four hits — two were home runs and another was a double.
The Sooners had nine hits with two home runs and a double. Jennings, Parker and Jayda Coleman each had two hits on the day.
Up next
The Sooners will face Oregon in a rematch on Sunday at 2 p.m. with a spot in the super regional on the line. If they lose that game, they'll play again at 4:30 p.m. on Sunday.
The team that advances from the Norman Regional will face the winner of the Tallahassee Regional next weekend. Florida State is currently 2-0 and one win away from advancing from that regional.
Softball scores
Boston U 8, Cleveland State 0
Oregon 8, Boston U 0
(1) Texas 14, Northwestern 2
(5) Oklahoma State 6, Kentucky 2
Baylor 8, (13) Louisiana 0
(15) Florida State 5, UCF 1
(8) Stanford 2, Mississippi State 1
(3) Tennessee 12, Virginia 0
(9) LSU 4, Southern Illinois 1
(4) Florida 9, South Alabama 1
(10) Duke 8, South Carolina 0
(6) UCLA 7, Virginia Tech 6
(7) Missouri 5, Indiana 1
Tarik Masri is the sports editor for The Transcript covering OU athletics and area sports. You can reach him by emailing tarik@normantranscript.com
