Editor’s notice: The next article was revealed first on d1softball.com.
Inevitability is certainly one of many issues Oklahoma has seemingly mastered on a softball area.
As a brand new season begins, there may be Oklahoma … and there may be everybody else. The Sooners are as overwhelming as any crew in faculty sports activities in the meanwhile. They’re three-time defending champions, searching for to grow to be the primary crew in NCAA Division I historical past to win 4 in a row. They’ve a 176-8 report over these three most up-to-date seasons. They led the nation in scoring every time, in addition to in ERA the previous two seasons.
In 2021, for instance, they scored 211 extra runs than another crew. That meant the hole between the very best offense and second-best offense was equal to the hole between second and ninetieth.
All of that is the fruits of greater than a decade in ascendancy, a span wherein they’ve received six of the ten nationwide championships contested. With a lineup stuffed with All-People, former nemesis Kelly Maxwell within the circle and a brand new stadium about to open its doorways, Oklahoma feels, effectively, inevitable.
It might be. It wasn’t at all times. Nor was the rise that left it to rule over the game.
Lower than twenty years in the past, Oklahoma was a very good program, a nationally related program. However simply certainly one of maybe a dozen such packages. The truth is, as lately as 15 years in the past, you can have argued that Oklahoma’s signature function in softball historical past had already come and gone. By profitable the nationwide championship in 2000, 5 years after Patty Gasso arrived in Norman, the Sooners ended a stretch of 11 titles in 12 years for both Arizona or UCLA and successfully launched the fashionable period.
But it wasn’t the Sooners who initially appeared because the beneficiaries of the softball land rush. Quickly, Michigan received an much more traditionally vital title — the primary champion from east of the Mississippi River and the primary to undergo a brilliant regional and best-of-three title collection. For a lot of the brand new millennium’s first decade, as Arizona State and Washington received titles and Alabama, Florida and Tennessee lifted the SEC, different packages rose to problem Arizona and UCLA’s dominance.
Because the best-of-three championship collection took maintain, tv scores soared and attendance information fell virtually yearly within the WCWS, Oklahoma didn’t make the journey up Interstate 35 for six consecutive seasons. Texas and Baylor made it within the span. Missouri made it twice in its Huge 12 days. Texas A&M performed for a title in that span. Oklahoma remained absent. An excellent program. One among many.
So, how did we get from there to right here? Like all dynasty, from the Merovingians to UConn girls’s basketball, success is a narrative of individuals, circumstances and fortune. The suitable folks had been in the best locations and caught the best breaks to make good on their aspirations.
Because the 2024 Sooners attempt to make new historical past, and the remainder of the nation tries to seek out some strategy to cease what feels so inevitable, listed here are 10 inflection factors that assist clarify the period.
Keilani Ricketts arrives (2010)
For those who get proper all the way down to it, the present Oklahoma dynasty sprang to life twenty years in the past when Patty Gasso signed Samantha Ricketts. Sure, that Ricketts, the present Mississippi State head coach. As a result of when Gasso finally signed her, she was nonetheless Samantha’s youthful sister. Don’t take my phrase for it — it’s the primary little bit of figuring out information in her 2008 signing launch.
The elder Ricketts’ All-American expertise in Norman was an enormous purpose why the Sooners landed one of the prized recruits within the nation. And the two-time USA Softball Participant of the Yr, in flip, is an enormous purpose why the school softball world appears the best way it does now. As soon as Kami Keiter left the scene in 2004, following OU’s fifth consecutive World Sequence look, Oklahoma discovered itself the place no elite program desires to be: trying to find an ace. Pitchers had good seasons in that span, however in an period when an ace might nonetheless carry a crew on her again, the Sooners by no means had the pitcher groups feared in Could.
By 2009, the 12 months earlier than Ricketts arrived, Oklahoma ranked 81st within the nation in ERA. And North Dakota State walked out of Norman with a regional title.
Ricketts modified all of that. When she was a freshman, solely three pitchers within the Energy 5 had a greater ERA. Solely 4 struck out extra batters. It didn’t harm that Jessica Shults and Michelle Gascoigne joined her in a Corridor of Fame recruiting class. However even earlier than she mastered the “crop duster” or grew fully comfy because the focal point, she was that pitcher. And when you could have that pitcher, you’re again enjoying for the massive stakes on the championship desk.
A symbolic Tremendous Regional (2011)
The Sooners almost bought again to Oklahoma Metropolis when Ricketts was a freshman, profitable a 2010 tremendous regional opener at Washington earlier than Danielle Lawrie used each little bit of her expertise to fend off the upset (the second time that 12 months that Lawrie singlehandedly delayed the beginning of an period). In 2011, Oklahoma once more needed to go on the highway towards a Pac-12 opponent in a brilliant regional, this time visiting Arizona. The Wildcats had been a No. 8 seed, however they had been a 12 months faraway from enjoying for the nationwide title — and solely 4 years faraway from the second of back-to-back titles that ran their general complete to eight.
Mike Candrea’s program was softball royalty. Oklahoma was a decade faraway from its solely title.
However for the primary and solely time within the tremendous regional period, Oklahoma took the scenic path to Oklahoma Metropolis. Nor was Tucson simply any vacation spot. In 2005, the primary 12 months of the best-of-three spherical, Oklahoma’s bid for a sixth consecutive WCWS led to an Arizona sweep. In 2008, the identical story performed out within the desert, the Wildcats eliminating the Sooners in three.
So regardless of a pair of standard season wins towards Arizona in 2011, Oklahoma had historical past working towards it within the tremendous regional. Which proved to matter lower than having Ricketts working for it — she gave herself a two-run lead with a first-inning residence run within the finale and took it from there.
By 2012, it was Arizona that needed to journey to Norman for a brilliant regional, the Wildcats had been little greater than a velocity bump because the Sooners lastly returned to the World Sequence. Slowly, the tides shifted
Lauren Chamberlain lands (2012)
Numbers matter. And heaven is aware of there are many numbers with which to measure Oklahoma’s dominance these a few years. Dynasties are constructed on expertise and numbers matter greater than narrative in the case of assessing expertise. However life isn’t simply uninteresting with out intangibles, it’s incomplete. Folks and personalities meet moments of time which are made for them.
Lauren Chamberlain was all of it when she arrived within the 2012 season. She was tangible with hitting ability that rewrote the NCAA report e-book in black and white digits. However she was additionally technicolor, a persona who turned the sport right into a stage. How might Oklahoma presumably dream larger than Keilani Ricketts? By turning to somebody who thought she might fly, judging by her iconic residence run celebration.
Lauren Haeger, Hallie Wilson, Emilee Koerner, Chelsea Goodacre. Any of these gamers in Chamberlain’s class might have been All-People at Oklahoma, as they had been elsewhere. They’d have left beloved. They virtually absolutely would have received a title, as Haeger certainly did twice over at Florida. However Gasso didn’t simply get the very best slugging share or weighted on-base common when she signed Chamberlain. She bought the very best individual for the actual problem of cementing Oklahoma’s standing.
In 2013, with Chamberlain nonetheless nominally the understudy to Ricketts, Oklahoma’s dominance was a softball story. The Sooners led the nation in batting common, slugging share and ERA. However by 2015, as Chamberlain approached Stacey Nuveman’s longstanding NCAA profession residence run report, the Sooners had been a nationwide story. A viral phenomenon. Their star thrived within the function, a template for all who adopted.
Pitching interregnum (2014-15)
Spare a thought for Kelsey Stevens, destined to be the Sooner that historical past forgets — or no less than overlooks. The primary of Oklahoma’s switch aces, years earlier than the portal, Stevens had the unenviable activity of following Ricketts and Michelle Gascoigne. However in 2014, there wasn’t a lot she couldn’t shoulder.
With out Ricketts, Gascoigne and Shults, and with Chamberlain ailing for a lot of the season, Stevens threw almost 70 p.c of OU’s innings. She began 51 video games together with all three in a brilliant regional towards Tennessee. The crew’s success was hardly hers alone (see: Pendley, Shelby and an offense that ranked third nationally in runs per sport). However she pitched the Sooners again to the World Sequence, quelling any suggestion that one other spell of fallow years would observe after Ricketts.
That effort appeared to take its toll on Stevens’ physique in subsequent seasons, however it was the bridge to Paige Parker. After 4 years wherein Ricketts went 125-35 with a 1.23 ERA and reached the World Sequence thrice, Parker arrived in 2015 and went 123-18 with a 1.41 ERA and reached the World Sequence thrice in her 4 seasons. That’s the kind of succession plan that so many different would-be powers failed to seek out this century, falling again into the pack of contenders after profitable or enjoying for a title. With an help from Stevens, the Sooners constructed this period on almost a decade of uninterrupted aces.
Trusting the household enterprise (2016)
When longtime hitting coach Tripp MacKay stepped down following the 2015 season, Gasso knew she was taking a threat together with his alternative. Not as a result of she doubted his skill to do the job. She knew all about his virtually photographic reminiscence for each hitter who ever performed for the Sooners and relentless want to study. It was a threat due to the identify that she and JT Gasso, her eldest son, shared.
Complicating issues was that JT wasn’t simply taking on any job. After brief stints at Purdue and Michigan State, he took over an offense that led the nation in scoring and slugging the 12 months earlier than. And he didn’t have Chamberlain or Pendley to attempt to replicate that manufacturing.
How did it work out?
In 2015, underneath MacKay, Oklahoma averaged 8.4 runs per sport and slugged .657.
In 2023, they averaged 8.1 runs and slugged .666 — and people had been by far the crew’s most modest numbers throughout its present run of three straight titles.
In his six seasons performed to completion, JT’s lineups produced 4 of probably the most prolific offensive seasons in Division I historical past.
They’re liable for three of the 12 finest run-scoring seasons in Division I historical past. They personal half of the highest six single-season slugging percentages. They set the single-season report with 161 residence runs in 2021. They virtually broke the report in 2022.
Dynasties typically falter after they grow to be risk-averse. It’s simpler to be daring when there’s little to lose. Oklahoma’s coach took a threat, within the course of getting an up-and-coming hitting thoughts who retains her offense on the leading edge — and somebody whose loyalty is rarely in query.
“One factor that I don’t know lots of people find out about JT is that he’s a learner and needs to know extra and go to heights that different coaches don’t go to,” Gasso mentioned. “He’s very artistic, very clever. He desires to study new methods, alternative ways. I knew I used to be going to be judged, however I additionally knew sufficient about him that I had confidence he might do it.”