Sooners Set To Face Oral Roberts In Intrastate Battle

April 18, 2002

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NORMAN, Okla. -

Dates: April 19-21

First Pitches: Friday at 7:05 p.m., Saturday at 6:35 p.m., Sunday at 3 p.m.

Ballparks: J.L. Johnson Stadium (2,418) and L. Dale Mitchell Park (2,700)

Locations: Tulsa, Okla. and Norman, Okla.

Radio: All three games vs. ORU can be heard on KREF-1400 AM, as well as through OU's official athletic website, soonersports.com. James Hale will call the action.

Television: Friday night's game can be seen on Cox Cable in the Oklahoma City and Tulsa areas.

Rankings: For the first time in five weeks, Oklahoma is not ranked. The Sooners are, however, receiving votes in all three major polls. Oral Roberts is not ranked.

Coaches: Oklahoma is coached by Larry Cochell, who is 436-265-1 in his 12 seasons with the Sooners, and 1,232-725-4 over his 35-year coaching career. Sunny Golloway leads the Golden Eagles and has compiled a record of 269-128 in seven years at the school.

Series Notes: Oklahoma leads the all-time series with Oral Roberts by a margin of 28-25 ... Under head coach Larry Cochell, Oklahoma is 8-5 against the Golden Eagles ... Cochell served as head coach at ORU from 1977 through 1986 and is the school's all-time winningest coach with a record of 428-171-2 ... Cochell took Oral Roberts to seven NCAA Regionals and the 1978 College World Series ... He served as athletic director at the school during his final three years (1984-86) ... ORU head coach Sunny Golloway was an assistant at Oklahoma from 1992 through 1995 ... Golloway helped lead the Sooners to three College World Series appearances (1992, 1994 and 1995), including the 1994 national title ... ORU OF Sam Cone signed out of high school to play football at Oklahoma, however went to Seminole State College, along with ORU C William Mills, where they were teammates with current Sooner Reggie Willits ... ORU infielder Scott Campbell was a high school teammate of OU P Jarod McAuliff at Stillwater (Okla.) HS ... Oral Roberts' Wilton Reynolds attended the same California junior college, Consumnes River, as OU's Heith Gadient ... Six graduates of Owasso (Okla.) High School will take part in this weekend's series: Oklahoma's Mark Roberts and Michael Bradbury, and ORU's Layle Devilbiss, Stockton Davis, Tommy Pratt and Kevin Lamb.

Scouting Oral Roberts

Let the battle for Oklahoma begin! Oklahoma and Oral Roberts have an incredible number of connections and will battle for state surpemacy this weekend with one game in Tulsa and two in Norman. The Golden Eagles are 23-11 on the season, including wins in 12 of its last 15 ballgames. ORU has defeated Big 12 member Kansas twice and split a two-game set with Oklahoma State last weekend. In February, Baylor swept three games from ORU and Arizona State topped Oral Roberts, but the Golden Eagles have beaten Texas-Arlington and Western Illinois (both OU opponents) twice apiece.

Catcher David Castillo was a Freshman All-America in 2001 and is ORU's top hitter this season, boasting a .400 batting average, 21 doubles, nine home runs and a team-high 49 RBI. Wilton Reynolds garnered All-Mid-Continent honors a year ago and is batting .366 with a team-high 10 homers. Eric Thornton (.358, 27 RBI), Doug Bernier (.357), Billy Joe Richard (.355) and Chad Stewart (.320, 24 RBI) are all dangerous hitters in the ORU lineup.

As a team, Oral Roberts has a batting average of .315 and has stolen an incredible 83 bases on the season, nearly 30 steals more than Oklahoma, also a running team. Danny Boyle is 19-for-22 on steal attempts this season, while Erick Donaldson is 16-for-20. Kevin Lamb and Reynolds are both a perfect 8-for-8 in base swipes.

Senior Michael Rogers leads the Oral Roberts pitching staff, with his 7-1 record, 3.33 ERA and 73 strikeouts in 70.1 innings pitched. Rogers was named a second-team All-American in 2001 and has continued to improve for the Golden Eagles. Rene Ricio is 6-3 on the season, with a team-high 80 strikeouts and a 1.95 ERA. Stockton Davis is an effective third starter for Sunny Golloway's club and Dennis Bigley has picked up three wins. Andrew Sanderson (2-2, 2.00 ERA) and Dallas Martin (0-1, 3.86 ERA) are key members of the ORU bullpen. Oral Roberts' team earned run average is 3.61 and the pitching staff is holding opponents to a batting average of just .241.

Oklahoma Tops TCU, Falls To UTA In Mid-Week Showdowns

The Oklahoma baseball team earned an important win on Tuesday night at L. Dale Mitchell Park, defeating a tough TCU team by a score of 7-3. Freshman David Purcey (2-2) notched the win in his first start as a Sooner, after pitching six innings, allowing just one run on five hits and striking out five Horned Frogs. Reggie Willits, Luke Alexander, Ryan Richardson and Denver Kitch all homered for the Sooners, who cranked out 13 hits and improved to 21-15 on the season.

"That was an important win for us, against a good ball club in TCU," said Oklahoma head coach Larry Cochell. "Every win is important, but hopefully that one can get us going down the stretch. (David) Purcey had an outstanding game and the ceiling on his potential is just so high. I was happy with his performance. Brandon Jones made his first start against TCU as well, and did a nice job. He's a phenomenal athlete who just needs to see live pitching in game situations."

The Sooners fell to the UTA Mavericks by a score of 10-5 Wednesday evening, however. UTA pounded out 15 hits and topped the Sooners for the second time this season. Willits' second homer in as many days and 12 OU hits went for naught in the losing effort. Oklahoma commited five errors in the game.

Austin Mix (4-4) took the loss for Oklahoma after pitching just one inning and allowing five runs on five hits. It was the junior's second loss of the season to UTA. Michael Bradbury made the start for OU, went five innings and allowed three runs on seven hits. Buddy Blair went three frames and, despite giving up two runs, struck out three and was effective.

Jones To Be Busy This Weekend

Brandon Jones has started in center field for the past two games and looks to be earning more playing time down the stretch for the Sooners. Jones is batting .364 (8-for-22) with a triple, a home run and three RBI on the season. He is also a talented wide receiver and punt returner for Oklahoma's nationally-ranked football team.

Bob Stoops' squad will take part in the annual Red-White scrimmage on Saturday at 1 p.m. at OU's Memorial Stadium. Jones will participate with the football team and hustle over to L. Dale Mitchell Park for Saturday evening's OU-Oral Roberts contest.

Greusel Leaving His Impression

When he entered OU's contest with TCU on April 16, Evan Greusel moved into second place in the OU record books in appearances. Greusel pitched two perfect innings against the Horned Frogs to notch his first save of the season. Teammeate Rocky Cherry holds the school-record with 78 appearances, earned last year when he surpassed Casey Mendenhall's 71 appearances as a Sooner. The senior from Diamond Bar, Calif., currently has 202 strikeouts for his career and needs just 13 more to move into the top 10 on the all-time school list. Greusel also needs five more innings pitched to crack the top 10 in that statistical area.

Oklahoma Is RICH Behind the Plate

Oklahoma came into this season with a question mark behind the plate as no experienced catchers returned. However, more the halfway through this season, Ryan Richardson and Spencer Wyman have erased those questions. Richardson, a sophomore from Mesa, Ariz., is batting .351 with seven home runs and 15 RBI.

He hit two solo homers in an April 7 game with Nebraska, and did the same against Texas exactly one week later. The homers accounted for OU's only runs in both of those games. In his last four games, he has homered three times, after not going deep at all at Central Arizona College a year ago. Wyman came to OU from Cal-Berkley and has hit three homers with 13 RBI.

Walk-Off Willits

One of Oklahoma's top players and most clutch performers this season has been junior Reggie Willits. Willits has recorded two game-winning, walk-off base hits during the 2002 slate and has established himself as Mr. Clutch for the Sooners. In OU's 6-5 win over Baylor in the second leg of an Easter doubleheader, Willits knocked a base hit into right field to bring home Ryan Richardson and seal the game, and the series, for Oklahoma.

Against Missouri on March 8, the junior transfer from Seminole State College had a RBI base hit to tie the game in the ninth inning, and in the 12th, Willits roped a single to center for the game-winning RBI. He currently has a .311 batting average, two homers, seven doubles, 12 stolen bases and 18 RBI. The switch hitter has belted home runs in each of his last two games, one from each side of the plate.

Bose and Purcey: Freshman All-America Candidates

OU head coach Larry Cochell snared two gems from the Lone Star State last recruiting season in Matt Bose and David Purcey. Bose, a third baseman from Midland, has smacked 13 doubles, four home runs, has driven in 27 runs (second on the team) and is improving every day at the hot corner. Bose's RBI base hit in the seventh inning against Texas on April 12 was the first game-winning hit of his OU career.

Purcey is quickly establishing himself as one of OU's top pitchers, picking up two wins, six saves and striking out 43 batters on the season (third-most on the club). He made his first career start against TCU on April 16, and picked up the win by pitching six innings, allowing just one run of five hits and striking out five. Purcey's six saves this season are the sixth-most in Oklahoma history and the most for a freshman at OU. The 6-5, 235 pounder has been dominating at times and has an ERA of 2.58. In over 38 innings of work, opponents are hitting just .215 against him.

Fransz Named Phillips 66 Big 12 Player of the Week

Oklahoma junior outfielder Jason Fransz of Corona, Calif., was tabbed the Phillips 66 Big 12 Conference Baseball Player of the Week for his play during the week of March 4-10. Fransz had a career weekend against Missouri as the Sooners (11-4, 3-0 Big 12) swept the three-game series. He hit two home runs, drove in 11 runs, had 14 total bases (including two doubles, a triple and the pair of homers), scored five runs and produced a 1.000 slugging percentage while going 6-for-14 against the Tigers.

Fransz helped OU stay close in an the 10-9 comeback win in 12 innings, and then drove in seven runs with a three-run triple and a grand slam in the 16-10 OU triumph. Fransz's seven RBI were just shy of the OU school record of nine, most recently set in 1987 by Chris Ebright. The junior left fielder, who transferred to Oklahoma from Riverside (Ca.) Community College, now leads the Sooners with eight home runs and 35 RBI to compliment his .336 batting clip.

University of Oklahoma Athletics

Sooners Set To Face Oral Roberts In Intrastate Battle

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