Early mistakes, late homers sink Oklahoma in CWS championship game 1 loss to Ole Miss

John Williams
·2 min read
4

The Oklahoma Sooners had been on a roll coming into this College World Series finals. Undefeated in the CWS, the Sooners had been playing as well as anyone for two months. That didn’t show up in game one of the College World Series finals against Ole Miss. The Sooners drop game one 10-3.

Oklahoma struggled with early jitters in this one as pitcher Jake Bennett’s control was off, leading to three wild pitches to go along with an error in the field that helped Ole Miss jump out to a 3-0 lead. Oklahoma couldn’t get

Though he gave up a home run to fall behind 4-0, Bennett settled in and pitched well to get Oklahoma into the sixth inning, where they finally did some damage at the plate.

Heading into the sixth, Ole Miss pitcher Jack Dougherty had been perfect for the Rebels. But the Sooners started to make things happen with three hits in a row to lead off the inning and scoring their first run off Kendall Pettis’ bunt single. With runners on first and second and nobody out, John Spikerman walked to load the bases for Peyton Graham, who struck out swinging on four pitches. Ole Miss reliever Mason Nichols followed up his strikeout of Graham by striking out Blake Robertson, and after Tanner Tredaway walked in a run, Jimmy Crooks grounded out to the pitcher to end the bases-loaded threat.

A scoreless seventh from Bennett and relief pitcher Chazz Martinez gave the Sooners the shutdown inning they needed to try and further cut into the Ole Miss lead.

But Mason Nichols wouldn’t allow it, striking out the Sooners to keep the Rebels ahead by two. But that two-run lead would balloon to eight when T.J. McCants, Calvin Harris, and Justin Bench hit back-to-back-to-back home runs to put the Sooners in a massive deficit.

Oklahoma added a run in the eighth to make it 8-3, but Ole Miss responded with two more in the ninth to put the game away for the 10-3 win. Now the Sooners turn to Cade Horton, hoping to bounce back to tie the series at one game a piece.

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