WEEK 5 SOONER SOFTBALL REPORT: The streak over, issues must be tackled
The Skinny
It’s possible for a team to play poorly and win.
It’s very possible for a team to pitch poorly and win, especially one like Patty Gasso’s Oklahoma softball team, which, over the weekend that produced its first loss after 71 straight victories also managed to raise its team batting average from .357 to .382.
Sports and life are filled with such paradoxes.
But for a few shaky outings in the circle, the Sooners did not appear to need a loss, a wake-up call, this lesson, that lesson, or several lessons, to remind themselves what good softball looks like. Up to Sunday, winning in spite of themselves, they weren’t. Yet, had the Sooners won Sunday, they would have, so maybe the loss came right on time.
“We knew a game like this would be coming at some time,” Gasso said. “I don’t know that we were ready to have it happen here [at Love’s Field], but it happened. Nothing was good enough today for us."
“We had the spirit of coming back, which was great, but from defense to pitching to timely hitting, we wasted a lot of time early in the game. This was a game we didn’t deserve to win.”
It was startling how poorly OU played in its first loss since Feb. 19, 2023.
Kelly Maxwell, who allowed two home runs and three runs, total, in just one inning of relief work against Liberty the day before, was similarly not sharp in a starter’s role, allowing five hits and three earned runs over 3 2/3 innings. Taking over in relief in the fourth, Karlie Keeney walked the first two batters she faced, the second free pass forcing home a run.
On the basepaths, Jayda Coleman left first base early to create the third out of OU’s half of the third inning. Later, in the sixth, Ella Parker turned an infield hit into an out by failing to touch first base. In that same inning, Kinzie Hansen allowed herself to get picked off second base. Spotting her walking so far into no-man’s land, Louisiana even pitched out to set up the play.
In the field, Kinzie Hansen flat dropped the ball on a throw to the plate, allowing a seventh-inning run. Alyssa Brito committed OU’s third and final error of the game in the eighth only because Keeney, still in the circle, was charitably not charged with one of her own on the very next batter. Jennings, also charged with an error in the seventh, failed to make two additional plays in the eighth. Though neither were judged errors, nor were they winning plays.
Perhaps the timing’s perfect given what begins this weekend: Big 12 Conference play with Iowa State visiting Norman.
A final note on the loss?
In the circle, at least, Gasso did not attempt to get in the way.
She could easily have lifted Keeney for Kierston Deal, S.J. Guerin or Paytn Monticelli when things got dicey in the seventh, but chose not to, rolling with Keeney to see what happened. It was an interesting no-call, when going to the bullpen might have saved the game. Also, perhaps, it was the right no-call, given the whole season is more important than selling out to a winning streak.
At the very least, the season’s now more interesting.
We get to see how OU responds to something that hasn’t happened in more than a year.
The Schedule
Last week
— def. Miami-Ohio 9-7
— def. Liberty 8-0 (five innings)
— def. Louisiana 8-0 (five innings)
— def. Liberty 15-3 (five innings)
— lost to Louisiana 7-5 (eight innings)
This week
— vs. Texas A&M-Commerce, 6 p.m. Wednesday
— vs. Iowa State, 6 p.m. Friday
— vs. Iowa State, 2 p.m. Saturday
— vs. Iowa State, 1 p.m. Sunday
Record: 18-1
Streak: Lost 1
Numbers
Entering last week
Games: 14
Batting average: .357
On-base percentage: .447
Slugging percentage: .601
Earned run average: 0.73
Strikeouts/innings pitched: 88/86
Fielding percentage: .989
Entering this week
Games: 19
Batting average: .382
On-base percentage: .466
Slugging percentage: .661
Earned run average: 1.39
Strikeouts/innings pitched: 114/116
Fielding percentage: .986
Leaders
Batting average: Rylie Boone .447 (Tiare Jennings .446, Alyssa Brito .446)
On-base percentage: Alyssa Brito .516 (Cydney Sanders .511)
Slugging percentage: Alyssa Brito .946 (Tiare Jennings .875)
Runs batted in: Tiare Jennings 22 (Alyssa Brito 19)
Home runs: Alyssa Brito 7 (Tiare Jennings 6)
Triples: Rylie Boone 1, Alyssa Brito 1, Avery Hodge 1
Doubles: Tiare Jennings 6 (Alyssa Brito 5)
Hits: Tiare Jennings 25 (Alyssa Brito 25)
Earned run average: Paytn Monticelli 0.00 (8 1/3 IP), S.J. Geurin 0.00 (6 IP)
Wins: Nicole May 6-0
Innings pitched: Kelly Maxwell 30
Strikeouts: Nicole May 36 (28 IP)
Notes on numbers
• The big boppers, Brito and Jennings: It’s reaching the point it’s hard to imagine anybody but Alyssa Brito and Tiare Jennings being the two heaviest bats in the Sooner lineup the whole season long after both enjoyed big weekends at the plate.
Brito’s slashing .446/.516/.946 after entering last weekend at .425/.500/.900 and has accumulated a team-high seven home runs to go with five doubles and a triple, making 13 of her 25 hits for extra bases. Meanwhile, Jennings is slashing .446/.500/.875.
Brito’s highlight of the weekend may have been going 3 for 3 with three doubles and two RBIs in Saturday’s 8-0 conquest over Louisiana. Saturday against Liberty, Jennings went 2 for 4, drove in two and hit a tape-measure home run to the last row of seats beyond left-center field.
• Here comes Sanders: If anybody else is to hit for average, power and get on base the way Brito and Jennings are doing it, pencil in Cydney Sanders as a candidate. Sanders is suddenly having her greatest impact since arriving in Norman from Arizona State. Last weekend, she raised her batting average 63 points to .313, her on-base percentage from .455 to .511, her home run count from two to four and her RBI total from five to 11. Perhaps most telling, entering the weekend having struck out a team-high seven times, she struck out just one more time over five games.
• Circle matters: Scanning the leaders above, you may have noticed OU continues to count two pitchers with earned run averages of 0.00. Simultaneously, they appear to be the least favored of the unit. If they were more favored, they would have pitched more innings, yet Paytn Monticelli’s 8 1/3 and S.J. Guerin’s 6 are considerably less than Kelly Maxwell’s 30, Nicole May’s 28, Karlie Keeney’s 25 and Kierston Deal’s 18 2/3.
How Gasso continues to use the six-deep unit will be interesting now that conference play is upon us. She appears to want to use everybody, never put anything close to a tired arm into the circle and revel in her options. Yet, if Sooner pitching doesn’t tighten up, will she not be pressed into shortening the rotation? But, should that happen, who will she shorten it to if the proven commodities are struggling, as they did over the weekend?
Diamond Notes
Deal still dealing
As mentioned above, Kelly Maxwell and Nicole May have pitched many more innings and yet there’s no doubt about it that OU’s best pitcher right now is Kierston Deal, whose last three outings have accounted for a five-inning complete game against Lamar, a seven-inning complete game against San Diego and four strong innings against Louisiana. All 16 innings have been scoreless, over which time she has allowed seven hits, all singles, striking out 18 against four walks. The oddity is Gasso only pitched Deal five innings over the weekend when she was clearly the Sooners’ most effective pitcher. How Gasso chooses to use Deal this week against how she chooses to use Maxwell and May will at least be interesting, perhaps fascinating.
Always on base
Gasso very nearly trots out a new batting order every game. During one postgame session over the weekend, explaining how Jayda Coleman might bat leadoff one day and in the nine-hole the next, she said the Sooners rely heavily on analytics. Like, if OU’s facing a low-ball pitcher, perhaps a player who prefers the ball up might bat later than otherwise, taking advantage of seeing more pitches from the dugout before facing that pitcher themselves.
That’s cool, but if Gasso were going conventional, she’d probably lead Rylie Boone off, bat Kasidi Pickering second and Coleman ninth, hoping to turn the lineup over. The reason? Boone’s batting .447, getting on base at a .500 clip and doesn’t hit for much power. Pickering is hitting .435 and carrying a .500 on-base percentage. With three home runs, she has power, too, but not like Brito, Jennings and Sanders. Coleman’s no slouch, hitting .382 with an on-base percentage of .449.
Gasso, of course, knows more than all of us.
Missing Lyons
Great defense is about much more than not making errors.
As mentioned earlier, in addition to suffering her first error of the season in OU’s loss to Lousiana, shortstop Tiare Jennings failed to make two other plays in the eighth inning that cost the Sooners. One came on a chopper to her right that she laid out for, only for the ball to bounce in and out of her glove, allowing a Rajin’ Cajun run to score and all runners to advance. The next, a hot shot to her right that did not demand diving, Jennings reached for it only to have the ball glance off her glove. Watching it live, it appeared she either misjudged how far she needed to move her feet to reach the ball or simply short-armed the reach, selling out in hopes of turning a double play. In both, she appeared uncertain and she was not alone looking that way among Sooner fielders.
It’s very hard statistically prove how much difference an all-time fielder at the diamond’s most busy position can make, because so much of it’s about the feel and confidence that creates for the the eight other gloves, factors statistics can’t measure.
What stats can measure are errors and unearned runs and a year ago OU suffered 19 errors and six unearned runs over 62 games. This season, it’s seven errors and (already) six unearned runs over 19 games.
The new polls
Despite losing, the Sooners remained No. 1 in the Softball America top 25, one spot in front of Texas (17-1). In the Division1softball.com top 25, which also updates Monday, the Sooners fell to No. 2, behind Texas.
In the same two polls, in the same order, Oklahoma State (17-2) is No. 4 and No. 7 and Baylor (11-3) is No. 10 and No. 13. LSU (19-0), No. 4 and No. 3, is the nation’s only unbeaten team.
Until next time …