Six Unanswered Sends No. 5 Oklahoma State Past Kentucky
STILLWATER, Okla. – After scoring twice in the top of the first inning, the Kentucky Softball team was shutout the rest of the way as Oklahoma State scored six unanswered runs to book its ticket into the 2024 Stillwater Regional final on Sunday with a 6-2 win over the Wildcats.
Kentucky with the loss falls into the elimination bracket, as it will play the winner of Michigan and Northern Colorado at approximately 6 p.m. ET tonight on ESPN+ with the winner advancing into Sunday’s regional final and the loser’s season coming to an end.
The first five batters reached in the top of the first for Kentucky with four hits and an error as Kentucky surged out to a 2-0 lead and still had the bases with nobody out against national player of the year finalist, Lexi Kilfoyl. After Kilfoyl was able to get out of the inning with no further damage, she retired 21 the final 22 batters of the game in order, with 12 strikeouts, the new season-high against a Rachel Lawson coached team in any postseason game.
Stephanie Schoonover took the loss with 3.0 innings pitched with six hits, four runs, all earned and one strikeout with four walks. Jaden Vickers pitched the final four innings of the game in relief only allowing one run on three hits with three strikeouts.
Key Play
With the bases loaded and no outs in the top of the first, Ally Hutchins hammered a ball to deep CF, that hit the top of the wall and bounced back into play preventing a grand slam that would have made the game 5-0 UK.
Key Player
The key player was Jaden Vickers, who went the final 4.0 innings.
Key Stat
19. Lexi Kilfoyl pitched for Oklahoma State and retired 19 batters in a row at one point before Karissa Hamilton beat out an infield single to end the streak in the top of the seventh with one out.
Run Recap
RBI singles with the bases loaded by Grace Lorsung and Ally Hutchins with the bases loaded and no outs gave Kentucky the 2-0 lead in the top of the first inning. UK 2, OSU 0
In the bottom of the first, the Cowgirls led off the inning with a home run and scored three more times, including on a sac fly and two extra-base hits to take the 4-2 lead. OSU 4, UK 2
In the bottom of the third back-to-back two-out doubles plated Oklahoma State’s fifth run of the game to extend the lead to three. OSU 5, UK 2
OSU scored its final run on a solo home run in the bottom of the sixth to make it a four-run lead. FINAL – Oklahoma State 6, Kentucky 2
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