Stanford coach Jessica Allister provides approach at the plate needed in nail-biter vs. Texas at WCWS

Stanford suffered a loss to Texas in the opening game of the Women’s College World Series but has managed to bounce back to fight its way out of the loser’s bracket and force a rematch in the WCWS semifinals.

The game was going remarkably well through the first three innings, too, though the Cardinals had yet to put a run on the board.

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Staring down a 0-0 tie through the first three frames, Stanford coach Jessica Allister provided the blueprint for her team to start making better contact and string together some hits and eventually runs.

“Yeah, I think we’re letting her get away with the low strike early and then we’re susceptible to the change-up and the high strike,” Allister said. “So when we get something down in the zone that we can handle I think we need to be a little bit more aggressive early on.”

Texas pitcher Teagan Kavan is elite, though. She threw a complete game shutout against Stanford in the first meeting and was cruising in the early going against the Cardinal on Monday night.

Stanford had just one hit through the first three innings, a single through the right side by third baseman Jade Berry.

Texas threatened to score in the top half of the fourth inning after getting a one-out double to right center field, but Stanford pitcher NiJaree Canady was up to the task. She recorded the final two outs of the inning to keep the game scoreless.

All in all, Stanford was giving itself a chance against the nation’s No. 1 team. The disappointment of the opening loss certainly seems to have faded, perhaps even serving as further motivation for the squad.

“I wouldn’t say we talked about it much,” Allister said. “I think we talked about it afterwards and we weren’t happy with the way we played and we didn’t think it was a good representation of who we are as a team. So excited to still be playing ball and really happy with the way we’ve played since then.”

Should Stanford win on Monday night, the two teams would meet for a winner-take-all game on Tuesday night for the right to advance to the championship series. The ‘if necessary’ game was originally scheduled for Monday night, but delays pushed the ‘if necessary’ game in both halves of the bracket to Tuesday.

Florida forced a winner-take-all game against Oklahoma in the opposite side of the bracket with a win Monday.