Bedlam 2024--Sooners vs the Cowgirls--For All The Marbles!!!

[TropicalSooner]

Well, now it's time for the much anticipated pitching duel between Maxwell and Kilfoyl. Both pitchers are having very good seasons on their respective teams. Both have been named to a POY watchlist. Both are formidable pitchers especially when they are "on" and the umpire has a decent strike zone. Some fans, or posters to message boards at least, expect these pitchers to throw both game one and game three. How fast and how well they recover in that time span may dictate the series outcome. While I am mentally invested in wanting the Sooners to ''Sweep" this series, I also think that the most realistic outcome will be coming away with a 2 game series win. Also most likely, that would give the Sooners a tie for first place in the conference, because the Shorthorns last series will be in Lubbock against Tech, and with their staff and hitting prowess, they can probably sleepwalk through that set and come away with 3 wins.

So how do we set up against our in-state foe? My initial thinking was that we would be more at a disadvantage because the Cowgirls have taken batting practice against Maxwell for years now, but when I took a deeper look at it, that was not necessarily the case.
Yes, there are a few starters on the Cowgirls team that have had lots of BP against Maxwell. Sophomore Tallen Edwards, and transfers Micaela Wark and Megan Bloodworth, have all had a full season last year taking BP with KellyMax. But the rest of the lineup---not so much. The rest of the starters for the Cowgirls are two Freshmen, two transfers for this season, and two Sophomores that only saw limited playing time off the bench as freshmen and probably had limited, if any, BP against Maxwell. And for the three starters that did take BP against Kelly last year, I'm betting she remembers the pitches she would throw them that they had trouble with, and they will get a steady diet of those, plus, hopefully, some new ones.
On the other hand, Most all of our entire starting lineup except for our two Freshmen, saw Kilfoyl in two of the three game series last year. And, our team does film study. Now whether that will help any when they step to the plate, only time will tell. But I'm sure they all have memories of how they approached Kilfoyl at the plate...and Aycock and Rosenberry as well. Rosenberry faced 8 batters in one game last year-nearly through the lineup, and Aycock faced 31 over two games. Kilfoyl wound up facing 46 batters over two games, so we've seen her quite a bit.
One other factor which is a bit of an unknown is the Cowgirls new pitching coach, Carrie Eberle. J.T. probably, over the years, had a feel for how their former long term pitching coach preferred to call their games against us, but this will be a new wrinkle. At least, J.T. has seen her actually pitch in the one year she spent with the Cowgirls back in 2021, so he may have some idea how she might prepare their staff for the upcoming series.

The Cowgirls offense is lead by Sr catcher Caroline Wang (xfr from Liberty) hitting .380 along with 6 other starters hitting over .300. The young Cowgirl team has been a surprise to me to have come as far as they have this season. With huge losses of Senior laden offense and leadership last year, Coach G has put together a valid team of young achievers that have rallied around him and have shown a lot of grit this year. My perception of this team is one of "us against the world" and it seems Kenny G has used that mantra well in molding a very competitive team. However, their youth may also be a disadvantage for them as they will not have played in front of this large of a hostile environment yet this season. But I'm also certain that Kenny G desperately wants to take this series to show the world how much "better off" they are after the departure of Kelly Maxwell. This game is probably more personal and for pride for Kenny G than winning a conference championship (although if Tejas wins their series this weekend, then OSU is out anyway.)

As has been pointed out, the young Cowgirls, while not necessarily error prone, do have a few more defensive errors than the Sooners. And I agree, that if they stumble on defense in the field, we need to be aggressive and push an error or errors into a snowball effect to add on runs while we have that opportunity. And while we do have a small edge in fewer defensive errors, what the Sooners really need to be mindful of are offensive errors--leaving the base too early, and baserunning errors. Those events have snuffed out rallies in many games this season. And we simply cannot have home runs taken off the scoreboard because a runner left early. That not only could nullify gaining a lead, but totally swing game momentum in the opposite direction.

Offensively for us--I think it is key for every at bat to be disciplined. Kilfoyl is a very good drop ball pitcher, and we must not chase those with golf clubs, but force her to throw up in the strike zone. And when she does, we then need to "See ball. Hit ball." If we force her up into the zone and then let meatballs go by without a swing, things will not end well.

Defensively--just play loose and enjoy the game. Be aware who is on which base and limit throwing errors. Our errors this season, while few in number, seemed to come in bunches in games that we lost control of. The Louisiana game we lost, we had 3 errors. The BYU game we lost, we had 2 errors. There were probably some other "errors" that were not called that, particularly in away games where it is easier to be subjected to a little bit of "home cookin" in which some (not all) scorekeepers give their home team a "hit" rather than charge us with an "error". Nevertheless, if we don't make the 'phantom error', and instead get the out, then the question is moot.

Whatever advantage we may have about seeing Kilfoyl (and Aycock & Rosenberry) last year, we do need to recognize that they may have improved their craft as well and present additional challenges. Two examples come quickly to mind. Two years ago, we run-ruled Orme and Binford 3 times during the year. But when we faced them in Feb of '23, they shut us down and gave us (and Bahl) our only loss. Similarly, last year in the Texas series, we faced Gutierrez three times scoring 11 runs and giving her the loss in 2 games. This year, in Austin, she shut us down and won 2-1. My point is that pitchers change, and while we saw a lot of Kilfoyl and her backups last year, we will need to be ready to adapt quickly to whatever approach they take in facing us this time.


To me, it appears that Coach Gasso will pull out all the stops to sweep this series, and I think that may mean adjusting the pitching rotation to Maxwell / Deal / Maxwell.....with May constantly warmed up to provide middle inning relief. If May does indeed start game two....with Deal moving to game three.....then possibly Keeney might be used in late inning relief for May to keep Deal fresh for game 3.

Finally, if you haven't yet pulled up OUBeliever's Preview Thread posted earlier, do yourself a favor and go read it. He has provided an enormous amount of information, statistics, and analysis on how the games shape up for this weekend. We are fortunate to have someone with his experience and knowledge willing to share his thoughts about our softball team and the games they play.