Sooners baseball with the 10-0 run-rule of ORU
Oklahoma Sooners baseball may have found something. No, it’s not necessarily a total cure to the midweek. But it’s most certainly a start. And stacking performances like that will help the cause.
Tuesday night, left-hander Grant Stevens paced Oklahoma on the mound for six innings of shutout baseball allowing his offense to settle in on a chilly night at L. Dale Mitchell Ballpark. The result? A 10-0 run-rule of Oral Roberts.
A step in the right direction to finish a season-long eight-game homestand. And something of an answer following a rough weekend in which Oklahoma lost its first conference series of the year to West Virginia.
“We all know that Saturday was a let down. But we have a great team. We have a team that’s going to go out there and compete. We didn’t show our best baseball but we knew were going to bounce back and we knew we were going to win a game today,” said second baseman Jackson Nicklaus.
Six Oklahoma hitters recorded multi-hit games, led by Nicklaus and Bryce Madron with three hits apiece.
“We talked about having that relentless spirit that we’ve been kind of priding ourselves on picking each other up. That’s kind of our mantra of our team,” said Nicklaus. “If the guy in front of you doesn’t get it done then you’ve got to be the guy to pick him up and help the team win the game.”
A mantra that will be ultimately important over the next few weeks with John Spikerman (hand) and Carter Frederick (thumb) sidelined with injuries.
STEVENS SETS THE TONE
Grant Stevens isn’t unfamiliar to starting role. He did it on Fridays at Pacific. He’s done it once already this season. He’s crafty. A strike thrower. It’s comfortable. And most important, he finds ways to win picking up a team-leading fourth victory on Tuesday.
After issuing a five-pitch walk to start the game, Stevens locked back in pounding the strike zone and producing outs, retiring 10 of the first 11 batters he faced. Setting a tone for the night.
“I thought he was a little out of character when he walks a guy on four pitches. He’s usually a strike-thrower but he settled back in and us scoring three early it helped a lot,” said Oklahoma head coach Skip Johnson. “Kind of took some pressure off him and he got rolling a little bit.
“He made some big pitches in that game. Kind of kept it at bay. Our offense started having more quality at bats. Started getting a little more confident. And you kind of saw how it just kept going and they got more confidence as their at bats got a little bit better.”
Oklahoma’s 15 hits Tuesday night were the most Oklahoma had recorded in a game since March 10.
But it started with Stevens effort on the mound.
“He just showed off his veteran presence that he has, has great pitch ability,” said Nicklaus. “He was talking about it in the first inning. Came back in the dugout after the first inning saying that first batter is on me. And he goes I’m not going to lose control like that again I’m going to go out there and dominant pitches and he went out there and did that.”
