OU Softball: Oklahoma 'Has to Step Up' to in Tuesday Elimination Game vs. Florida

The Sooners have their backs against the wall for the first time in the NCAA Tournament with a trip to the WCWS Championship Series on the line.

Brett Rojo-USA TODAY Sports

OKLAHOMA CITY — The 2024 season has been, by modern Oklahoma softball standards, turbulent. 

The No. 2-seeded Sooners dropped just six games during the regular season, but lost a pair of series to Texas and Oklahoma State. 

In the past, the thought of beating OU on consecutive days seemed more of a dream than an attainable goal. 

But the Longhorns and the Cowgirls proved it can be done, and now Tim Walton’s Florida Gators hope to be the third team to pull it off. 

Patty Gasso’s team stumbled Monday at Devon Park, formerly USA Softball Hall of Fame Stadium. 

Though they were credited with no actual errors, the Sooners shot themselves in the foot over and over in the 9-3 loss to the Gators, bringing an elimination game that could see OU’s streak of three straight national titles snapped. 

Monday went about as poorly as anyone in the Oklahoma dugout could have drawn up, but catcher Kinzie Hansen is confident the trials of the regular season have prepared her team to stave off elimination and advance to a fifth-straight WCWS Championship Series. 

“The Sooners play best after we get punched in the mouth,” Hansen said on Monday. “That's what I've learned this season.”

If OU’s play is to match Hansen’s prediction, the team will have to be better in every area. 

Defensive hiccups cost Oklahoma runs. 

Baserunning decisions that Gasso owned up to kept more runs off the board, and OU hit a dismal 2-for-11 with runners in scoring position against Florida freshman right-hander Keagan Rothrock. 

Thankfully for the Sooners, Walton let Rothrock go the distance on Monday, giving Oklahoma 130 pitches worth of data to game plan for heading into Tuesday’s must-win contest. 

“We're going to go back and look at our at-bats so we know exactly what we were seeing,” Gasso said. “It was, yeah, helpful to see that.”

Before getting rolling on Monday, the Sooners and the Gators had to wait through a three-hour rain delay. 

As a result, the second meeting between the two teams was pushed back to Tuesday, which otherwise would have been an off day between the semifinals and championship series. 

For Oklahoma that schedule change could be a gift, as it gives Gasso and her son, associate head coach and hitting coach JT Gasso, a chance to mull over a new game plan. 

“We have time, which is nice,” Gasso said. “We really are big advocates. JT does a really good job looking at video. … We can go back and see what we did not do well.

“… Same thing with our pitchers. We need time. We need a little bit of recovery, as well.”

OU’s biggest pitching adjustment will simply be to start left hander Kelly Maxwell. 

Nicole May, Kierston Deal and Karlie Keeney all saw action in the circle on Monday, clearing the path for Oklahoma’s ace to try and replicate her stellar outing against UCLA. 

Maxwell will provide a boost, but Gasso knows she alone can’t win the game and fire Oklahoma into the Championship Series. 

“This team has to step up, as well,” Gasso said. “We didn't play well enough to win this game all around. It wasn't just pitching. It was all the way around. That's kind of what went into it.”

First pitch between Oklahoma and Florida will be at 1 p.m. on Tuesday, and the winner will meet 1-seeded Texas waiting in the wings. 

“We know a game plan. We didn't stick with it today,” OU shortstop Tiare Jennings said Monday. “But good thing about this is we have another day, we know who they're going to throw, what's going to happen. 

“It's already written. We're just going to go out there and focus on what we can do.”