No. 1 Sooners roll past Florida State in opening game of WCWS Championship Series, 5-0
OKLAHOMA CITY — As good as the Florida State softball team has been all season, the No. 3 Seminoles likely would have needed to play a near-perfect game or get a couple of big breaks Wednesday night to end No. 1 Oklahoma’s 51-game win streak.
The Seminoles got neither. And OU’s NCAA-record streak is now at 52.
After playing to a scoreless tie through three innings, Oklahoma erupted for three runs in the bottom of the fourth inning and rolled to a 5-0 win in the opening game of the Women’s College World Series championship series.
The Sooners (60-1) now need just one more win on Thursday to claim their third consecutive national championship. Florida State (58-10) will need to win the next game to force a deciding Game 3 on Friday.
“Oklahoma is 60-1. So there’s a lot of teams that they’ve beat,” FSU head coach Lonni Alameda said. “We know that this is a tall task. They’re a great ballclub.”
Knowing she would need production from her deep pitching rotation to win the series, Alameda gambled again by not starting staff ace Kathryn Sandercock, and it worked fine for three innings.
But senior Mack Leonard hit the first batter she faced in the fourth and was lifted for freshman Makenna Reid, who promptly gave up an RBI double to Oklahoma clean-up hitter Kinzie Hansen.
Hansen then advanced to third on a passed ball and scored on a bloop single to make it 2-0. The Sooners tacked on another run when Reid couldn’t make a play on a short chopper.
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In what seemed like an instant, the Sooners took complete command of the game in front of a loud and partisan crowd.
Oklahoma sophomore starter Jordy Bahl was excellent in the circle for the Sooners. She allowed just two hits and pitched a complete game to record the win and improve to 22-1 on the season. She struck out 10 batters and walked one.
FSU’s hitters said Bahl was effective with each of her best pitches — a rise, drop and change-up — and she got more and more aggressive once the Sooners got the lead.
“When you’re that competitive and you’ve got three phenomenal pitches right in your hip pocket — and you’ve got a defense like that — it’s pretty tough to hit against,” Leonard said. “But we can make adjustments … and come out better tomorrow.”
OU added another run in the fifth and one more in the sixth for insurance.
Florida State actually had a chance to claim the lead in the top of the fourth inning, but Leonard’s line drive down the right-field line — with two runners in scoring position — landed just foul. The Seminoles ended up not scoring, and OU would take control in the bottom half.
The Sooners have not lost a game since suffering a 4-3 defeat to Baylor on Feb. 13.
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Talk about this story with other die-hard FSU football fans on the Tribal Council.
