No. 17 Oklahoma Baseball Team To Battle Baylor In Crucial Big 12 Series

March 28, 2002

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NORMAN, Okla. -

Dates: March 29-31

First Pitches: Friday at 6:30 p.m., Satuday at 2 p.m. and Sunday at 1 p.m.

Ballpark: L. Dale Mitchell Park (2,700)

Location: Norman, Okla.

Radio: All three games vs. Baylor will be on 1400 KREF and can also be heard through OU's official athletic website, www.soonersports.com.

Rankings: Oklahoma is ranked No. 17 in the Collegiate Baseball poll, No. 23 by Baseball Weekly/ESPN and 25th in the Baseball America listings. In the three major polls, Baylor is ranked as high as No. 10 and no lower than No. 12.

Coaches: Oklahoma is coached by Larry Cochell, who is 431-257-1 in his 12th season with the Sooners, and 1,227-717-4 over his 35-year coaching career. Baylor is led by Steve Smith, who during his eight years in Waco, has compiled a record of 271-163-1. Johnson was an assistant coach at Texas A&M and Mississippi state before taking over the head coaching job at BU.

Series Notes: Baylor leads the all-time series between the schools 20-17, however in Norman, Oklahoma is 9-4 versus the Bears ... Oklahoma and Baylor first met during the 1936 season, with BU taking an 8-5 victory ... Under head coach Larry Cochell, Oklahoma is 11-10 against BU ... Baylor won two out of three games during the 2001 regular season in Waco ... The scores from last season's series were 5-3 BU, 3-2 OU and 5-3 BU ... Rocky Cherry picked up Oklahoma's win over Baylor on March 17, 2001 ... OU features 10 players on this year's team who hail from the Lone Star State: Matt Bose (Midland), Blair Robinson (Allen), Brandon Jones (Texarkana), David Purcey, Scott Rooker and Aaron Adair (Dallas), Austin Mix, Rocky and Zack Cherry (Coppell) and Luke Alexander (Carthage).

Scouting The No. 12 Baylor Bears

Baylor enters its series with Oklahoma with a 19-9 record (8-4 in Big 12 play), however is looking to bounce out of a minor slump, in which the team has lost three of its last four. The Bears dropped two of three games at the hands of Missouri over the weekend and lost an out-of-conference tilt to TCU on Tuesday night, but on the season, BU has swept then-No. 6 Southern California at Dodgers Stadium in Los Angeles, Kansas and Oral Roberts. In addition, The Bears have won two of three games against both Texas and Nebraska, both of whom were ranked in the Top Ten at the time of the series. Baylor began the season with tough losses to highly-ranked Rice and Houston, as well as TCU, in the Astros College Classic at Enron Field in Houston, but have rebounded nicely.

The Bears are led offensively by Ross Bennett and Mike Huggins, both juniors who split time between first base and the outfield, junior outfielder Chris Durbin and freshman Michael Griffin. Bennett is batting .408 with 19 RBI, while Huggins has a .375 batting clip, an on-base percentage of .577 and 12 extra-base hits on the season. Durbin is batting .346 and against Kansas on March 17, hit a walk-off home run to seal the BU win. Griffin has hit four homers and has driven in 31 runs, both team-highs for Steve Smith's club, and Trey Webb leads the Bears on the basepaths with nine stolen bases. As a team, Baylor bats .309.

Baylor's pitching staff is led by the talented trio of Steven White, Jared Theodorakos and Justin Taylor, who will face the Sooners in that order this weekend. White is 3-0 with a 2.98 ERA, 34 strikeouts and his opponents are batting just .221 against him. He was the Big 12 pitcher of the week for his play during the week of March 4-10. Theodorakos is 2-1 with a 4.76 ERA and won national and conference pitcher of the week honors on Feb. 17, after carrying a no-hitter into the eighth inning against USC. Taylor has won five games and stucking out a team-high 40 batters.

Crimson Tide Rolls to 17-3 Win Over OU At Oklahoma City's Bricktown Ballpark

Alabama wasted no time in making itself feel right at home in Oklahoma City's beautiful SBC Bricktown Ballpark, building a 10-0 lead after three innings and cruising to a 17-3 win over Oklahoma. Bama scored three runs in the first inning, four in the second, three in the third and never looked back, as Tide catcher Jeremy Brown had a career night, going 3-for-5 with two doubles, four runs scored and a career-high five runs batted in. Every member of the Bama starting lineup registered a hit and all of the Alabama batters who had at bats reached base.

"We didn't play well at all and after spotting a good team like that 10 runs, it's very hard to come back," said Oklahoma head coach Larry Cochell. "We need to forget this one and bounce back, because we've got an important Big 12 series with Baylor coming up. It's our job as a coaching staff to encourage these guys and get their confidence back."

Charlie Frasier belted a towering home run into the upper deck in right field, his sixth round-tripper on the season and his second game in a row with a homer. Luke Alexander and Reggie Willits each doubled in the game.

No. 16 Texas A&M Wins Series Against Oklahoma

After being swept by Nebraska just one week before battling Oklahoma, Texas A&M picked up a crucial series win with two victories last weekend in College Station, Texas. The Aggies won a nail-biter on Friday night, scoring two runs in the bottom of the ninth inning to pull out a 5-4 victory. Oklahoma took a 4-3 lead on Jason Fransz's seventh home run of the season, but the Sooners were unable to hold the lead and A&M's Matt Alexander hit a sacrifice fly to bring in the winning run.

OU bounced back in the second game of the series, winning a sloppy 9-8 contest, but a win nonetheless. The Sooners committed a season high six errors, but still managed to get the 'W' with a five-run seventh inning, highlighted by Luke Alexander's RBI double. OU scored two runs on wild pitches and one on a passed ball in the inning. Michael Bradbury earned his second win of the season after throwing two innings and a third and allowing just one unearned run on four hits. A&M stormed out to a 9-0 lead in the series-deciding game, almost entirely in a huge second inning in which its first seven batters all scored. Travis Wong hit a towering grand slam and the Aggies cruised to the win. Charlie Frasier belted his fifth home run of the season, a solo shot, and Denver Kitch stole his 17th base, a team high and good for second in the Big 12 Conference. Attendance at A&M's Olsen Field was 6,009, 7,012 and 4,498, the three largest crowds to see Oklahoma play during the 2002 season.

University of Oklahoma Athletics

No. 17 Oklahoma Baseball Team To Battle Baylor In Crucial Big 12 Series

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