Oklahoma State won their first Big 12 softball title by beating No. 1 Oklahoma, 4-3, in eight innings Saturday in the final round of the Big 12 Championship at Hall of Fame Stadium.
The Oklahoma softball team was seeded No. 1 in the upcoming NCAA Tournament and will host a regional at Marita Hynes Field in Norman. OU will play Prairie View. Minnesota and Texas A&M are also in that regional.
OSU was seeded No. 7 and will host a regional with North Texas, Nebraska and Fordham. OSU will play Fordham at 7:30 p.m. Friday. It is a double elimination tournament.
On Saturday, with the score tied at three in the top of the eighth, the No. 6/7 Cowgirls (41-12 overall) loaded the bases with nobody out, then took the lead when Kiley Kiley Naomi took a four-pitch walk from Nicole May. Morgan May, who came on in relief in the fourth inning, shut the Sooners down in the home half of the inning to seal the victory and set off a wild OSU celebration.
The win marked Oklahoma State’s first conference title since the Cowgirls won the Big Eight regular season crown in 1995 and was the Cowgirls’ first time winning a conference tournament since OSU claimed the 1992 Big Eight crown.
It also marked the second straight year that the Cowgirls beat a No. 1-ranked Oklahoma team and was the sixth win over the nation’s top-ranked team in program history.
“This is another feather in our cap as a program,” coach Kenny Gajewski said. “We just have to keep doing things we haven’t done before. We hadn’t won the Big 12 tournament, now we have.”
Day, who had wins over Texas in the semifinals and OU in the finals, was the Most Outstanding Player of the tournament and was joined by Chelsea Alexander, Chyenne Factor and Kelly Maxwell on the all-tournament team.
“We’re so happy for Morgan,” Gajewski said. “It goes to show if you are consistent in what you do and in how you prepare, good things will generally happen. Mo has done it the right way since the moment she arrived on campus. She embraced the Cowgirl way and has been all in and now she is getting everything she deserves. Good things happen to great people.”