Braden Davis earns Pitcher of the Week honors for OU (again)
For the second time in as many weeks, OU starting pitcher Braden Davis has been recognized by the Big 12 as the Pitcher of the Week. Davis earns the honor this week after throwing seven scoreless innings in the series opener at Texas Tech on Friday night. He allowed just two hits with two walks and eight strikeouts in an 8-0 victory.
Davis becomes the only Big 12 pitcher to earn Pitcher of the Week honors twice this season, also becoming the first to win in consecutive weeks. Over the last two weeks in starts against two of the most productive offenses in the league, Davis threw 12.1 innings. He gave up just a single run, while striking out 17 batters against Texas and Texas Tech.
But it’s more than just a good two week stretch for Davis who has become Oklahoma’s premier weekend starter. He’s won four starts in a row, striking out 35 batters over his last 24 innings. That improves his conference record to 5-1 in Big 12 play with 62 strikeouts (No. 2 in conference).
Oklahoma’s Friday/Saturday combo of Davis and Kyson Witherspoon (6.2 innings pitched, 4 hits, 3 runs, 5 walks and 7 strikeouts) were dominant over the weekend during a school-record fifth conference sweep. Texas Tech didn’t score its first run of the series until the sixth inning of Oklahoma’s 7-5 win on Saturday.
SOONERS RISE IN THE POLLS
Following a sweep of Texas Tech, Oklahoma rose four spots in the D1Baseball.com Top 25 to No. 18. They check-in at No. 17 in Baseball America and the USA Today Coaches Poll, where they rose six spots. And No. 18 in the NCBWA (National Collegiate Baseball Writers of America) top 25.
Oklahoma (29-17 overall, 18-6 Big 12) holds a three-game lead over the conference with six games to play, looking to win its first Big 12 regular season title in school history. Oklahoma is two wins shy of breaking the school record (19) for conference wins in a season.
CAN OKLAHOMA HOST A REGIONAL?
In short, yes, absolutely. We’ll see a number of the regional projections start to trickle out over the course of the next two days. But Oklahoma has played itself into favorable position with the NCAA tournament committee.
The easiest path to hosting would be winning the regular season conference title outright. That wouldn’t assure Oklahoma a regional host bid, but it certainly wouldn’t hurt the Sooners case. It’s something Oklahoma hasn’t done at L. Dale Mitchell Ballpark since 2010.
Skip Johnson and company heads into the final two weekends of the regular season No. 17 in the RPI and a top-10 strength of schedule nationally.
THIS WEEK’S SCHEDULE
Oklahoma closes out the regular season schedule at L. Dale Mitchell Ballpark hosting Baylor for a three-game series starting on Friday night at 6:30 p.m. All three games can be streamed on ESPN+ with Sunday’s finale serving as Oklahoma’s senior day.
