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OU Baseball: No. 9 Oklahoma Dominates at Oral Roberts

The Sooners went on the road and handled ORU with ease thanks to a near no-hitter and a big night at the plate from Trey Gambill and Dawson Willis.

John E. Hoover

Oklahoma outfielder Trey Gambill
Oklahoma outfielder Trey Gambill / John E. Hoover / Sooners On SI

Just in time for a significant conference road trip, Oklahoma turned in one of its best midweek performances of the season so far.

The No. 9-ranked Sooners routed Oral Roberts 11-2 on Tuesday night at J.L. Johnson Stadium in Tulsa.

Fueled by a near no-hitter on the mound and a huge night at the plate from Dawson Willis, Trey Gambill and Kyle Branch, the Sooners improved to 21-3 on the season. ORU fell to 15-9.

OU is 4-2 in Southeastern Conference play going into this weekend's big road trip to No. 12-ranked Alabama, having taken two of three in each of their first two SEC series against South Carolina and Mississippi State.

OU had lost six of its last eight games at ORU, but faced no such stress this time around.

After Will Edmunson led off with an infield single for the Golden Eagles, Sooner relievers Reid Hensley and Gavyn Jones combined to retire 13 consecutive ORU hitters before the home team strung together a pair of singles in the seventh inning.

Jones quickly got a 4-6-3 double play to end that threat, however.

The Golden Eagles struck twice in the first inning on the strength of that single, a wild pitch and a ground ball double play that put ORU up 2-0. OU starter Jacob Gholston faced just three batters, gave up two walks and a hit, and allowed two earned runs. 

OU got a run back in the second when Willis was hit by pitch with the bases full, bringing home Kyle Branch from third base.

In the third, the Sooners tied it when Jaxon Wilits came home from third on a ground ball double play.

Oklahoma took the lead with four runs in the fourth for a 6-2 edge on the scoreboard. Willis singled and scored on a wild pitch and Gambill drove home Jason Walk with a two-run home run to right field. Branch’s double to left scored Easton Carmichael to extend it to a four-run lead.

The Sooners blew it open with four more runs in the sixth — on just one hit, three walks and two ORU errors — to make it 10-2. Willis’ one-out single through the left side scored Drew Dickerson to make it 7-2, and Willis and Dasan Harris each scored on an error. Gambill then came home on Willits’ double play grounder.

OU added to it in the eighth when Branch led off with a double to left-center field and came home on Dickerson’s single to right center to put Oklahoma on top 11-2.

Willis finished 3-for-4 at the plate with two RBIs, and Gambill was 2-for-3 with a home run, a double and two RBIs. Branch went 3-for-5 with an RBI and two doubles.

Meanwhile, after Gholston’s rough first inning, Hensley threw five scoreless innings of relief and retired 14 of the 16 batters he faced. Jones threw two scoreless innings, and flamethrower Jackson Kircher closed it up with two scoreless innings,.

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John E. Hoover
JOHN E. HOOVER

John is an award-winning journalist whose work spans five decades in Oklahoma, with multiple state, regional and national awards as a sportswriter at various newspapers. During his newspaper career, John covered the Dallas Cowboys, the Kansas City Chiefs, the Oklahoma Sooners, the Oklahoma State Cowboys, the Arkansas Razorbacks and much more. In 2016, John changed careers, migrating into radio and launching a YouTube channel, and has built a successful independent media company, DanCam Media. From there, John has written under the banners of Sporting News, Sports Illustrated, Fan Nation and a handful of local and national magazines while hosting daily sports talk radio shows in Oklahoma City, Tulsa and statewide. John has also spoken on Capitol Hill in Oklahoma City in a successful effort to put more certified athletic trainers in Oklahoma public high schools. Among the dozens of awards he has won, John most cherishes his national "Beat Writer of the Year" from the Associated Press Sports Editors, Oklahoma's "Best Sports Column" from the Society of Professional Journalists, and Two "Excellence in Sports Medicine Reporting" Awards from the National Athletic Trainers Association. John holds a bachelor's degree in Mass Communications from East Central University in Ada, OK. Born and raised in North Pole, Alaska, John played football and wrote for the school paper at Ada High School in Ada, OK. He enjoys books, movies and travel, and lives in Broken Arrow, OK, with his wife and two kids.

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