Familiar Faces Await Sooners in Houston

Houston Classic
Feb. 17-18 | Houston, Texas | Cougar Stadium

Live Stats: Friday | Saturday

KEBC 1560

G1 | G2 (Saturday only; $)

Notes

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Weekend Schedule
Day	Opponent	Time (CT)
Friday	Incarnate Word	9 a.m.
Friday	RV/RV Ole Miss	2 p.m.
Saturday	Houston	4:30 p.m.
Saturday	Houston	7 p.m.

On the Air
Radio	1560 AM \| Chris Plank

NORMAN - No. 4/6 Oklahoma resumes play this weekend at the Houston Classic, hosted by Houston. Prior to two games Saturday against the host-Cougars, OU faces Incarnate Word and Ole Miss Friday.

All four games can be heard on KEBC 1560 in the Norman metro area or online via the link above. The two games against Houston will also be streamed for a fee on UHCougars.com..

Facing Incarnate Word

Oklahoma has never faced Incarnate Word, a private university in San Antonio, Texas. However, the Sooners are 59-10 all-time against UIW's conference, the Southland Conference. In fact, OU has won 23 straight and 36 of its past 38 against Southland teams. The Sooners' last loss against a Southland team came in 2004 to McNeese State.

OU last faced a Southland team a year ago, beating Lamar 12-2 in five innings in an opening weekend tournament.

Oklahoma has the following records against Southland teams: Central Arkansas (9-0), Lamar (1-0), McNeese State (11-2), Nicholls State (5-1), Northwestern State (6-0), Sam Houston State (10-7), Southeastern Louisiana (3-0), Stephen F. Austin (12-0) and Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (2-0).

Facing Ole Miss

In game one of the Regionals a year ago, Oklahoma used a seven-run second inning to coast to a 9-1, five-inning victory. Sophomore Shay Knighten was 3-3 in the game with 4 RBI, while junior Nicole Pendley was 2-2 with a homer and junior Kelsey Arnold was 2-3 with a run scored. Fellow junior Paige Parker struck out six and gave up one run on two hits and three walks.

The next day, Oklahoma beat Ole Miss 3-0 to advance to its seventh straight Super Regional. Parker had a perfect game through 3.2 innings and finished with just four hits allowed and one walk, while striking out nine on 83 pitches. Knighten and sophomore Fale Aviu each went 2-3 in the game.

Ole Miss sophomore Brittany Finney spent her freshman season at Oklahoma. While at OU, she played in 12 games with four starts in the circle. She was 1-0 with a save and a 1.12 ERA in 18.2 innings with 19 strikeouts, and as a hitter she was 2-4. Entering the weekend for the Rebels, Finney has started all four games and is 1-11 (.091) at the plate.

Ole Miss also has an Oklahoman on its roster: Raven Campos from Adair, Okla., and Northeastern Oklahoma A&M.

Facing Houston

Oklahoma is 6-1 all-time against Houston. OU has won four straight over the Cougars and is 4-1 all-time in Houston. The teams haven't met since playing twice in Norman during the 2013 season.

Two former Sooners are on the coaching staff at Houston as Kristin Vesely is in her first year as a head coach and Jessica Shults is in her first year as an assistant.

Vesely played at OU from 2003-06 and was a two-time All-American. She still ranks in OU's career top 10 for batting average, games played, hits at-bats, runs scored, doubles, triples, total bases and stolen bases. Vesely also played soccer for OU for four years. After playing one year in the NPF, she returned to OU to coach the Oklahoma Twisters U-14 team and then Blanchard high School. She joined Houston as an assistant coach in 2011 before becoming associate head coach in 2014 and head coach prior to this year.

Shults was a three-time All-American at OU and was a senior on OU's 2013 national championship team. Shults still holds the school record for career putouts (2,022) and fielding percentage (.995). She also ranks top-10 in several other categories, including on-base percentage, slugging, hits, runs, home runs, RBI, extra-base hits, total bases and walks. After her playing career, Shults was a student manager at OU in 2014 and a graduate student manager from 2015-16.

OU Slips in Latest Polls

After going 2-2 last week, OU fell three spots to No. 4 in the USA Today/NFCA Division I Coaches Poll and dropped five spots to No. 6 in the ESPN.com/USA Softball Collegiate Top 25.

Oklahoma is the only program to be ranked every week of the NFCA poll, 323 straight polls.

Quick Hits

Sophomore Caleigh Clifton leads Oklahoma in several offensive categories including average (.500), runs (3), walks (5), hit by pitch (2) and on-base percentage (.733) ... Clifton is also riding a career long seven-game hitting streak ... junior Nicole Pendley leads OU in both hits (5) and home runs (1) and is tied with sophomore Shay Knighten in RBI with three ... junior Paige Parker has struck out 10 in 12.0 innings with no walks issued so far this year ... Oklahoma freshmen are 5-18 (.278) at the plate so far with three runs scored and three driven in, while freshman pitcher Mariah Lopez threw 3.0 scoreless innings last weekend ... OU's defense has committed just one error in 109 chances through four games so far this year