• Rohlinger’s bat, Guerra’s arm give OU victory over Houston
Oklahoma came to L. Dale Mitchell Park Saturday with the lingering stench of a stunning loss to TCU.
The Sooners had been shipped to the losers’ bracket after giving up three runs in the top of the ninth inning. Having to beat Houston to keep their season afloat wasn’t going to be easy.
And it wasn’t, but those outs OU (41-20) couldn’t get Friday finally arrived Saturday in its 8-6 victory over the Cougars (39-22).
OU starter Steven Guerra took a no-hitter into the sixth inning and gave one of his best performances of the season.
“Our guys rode that,” OU coach Sunny Golloway said. “He was terrific.”
He took advantage of home plate umpire Travis Katzenmeier’s wide strike zone, holding the Cougars to four hits and matching a career high with eight strikeouts over 71/3 innings.
He stayed ahead in the count throughout the game. Eighty of the 113 pitches he threw were strikes.
“Getting ahead sets up every pitch because they’re looking either off-speed or fastball,” Guerra said after improving to 11-3. “It gave me a chance to keep them off balance and get them to chase pitches off the plate.”
Houston coach Rayner Noble thought the strike zone was a big issue. Five of Guerra’s strikeouts were on called third strikes.
“We have to give their starting pitcher (Guerra) a lot of credit for the job he did working with the strike zone that was available,” he said.
Houston didn’t put up much of a fight until late in the game.
OU, which was the visiting team, had the Cougars on the ropes early.
Ryan Rohlinger went 3-for-5 and drove in a career-high five runs to lead OU’s 14-hit afternoon.
Kody Kaiser’s second-inning homer put OU on the board and started a trend. Rohlinger added a mammoth three-run shot and Kevin Smith followed with a solo blast in the third inning for a 5-0 lead.
Houston starter Ricky Hargrove lasted only 32/3 innings. He allowed seven runs on eight hits and finished the season at 8-6.
“Oklahoma is a very good hitting team, so when you make mistakes down the middle that’s what happens,” Hargrove said. “It’s tough that it had to come in such a critical situation.”
Rohlinger added a two-run single in the fourth to put the Sooners on cruise control.
It was a redemptive performance for the senior third baseman. He didn’t come up with a ground ball Friday night that could have kept TCU from rallying.
“Ryan Rohlinger probably wore that (TCU) game as much as anybody because he’s a warrior,” Golloway said. “But he came out today and that ball he launched, I don’t know if it’s just now landing, but I think that was a statement to his teammates that he would be there for them.”
The Cougars had advanced to the super regional round the previous three seasons, but couldn’t get anything going until Guerra tired in the eighth.
But when he did, things got interesting.
Back-to-back homers from Matt Weston and Brad Lincoln cut it to 8-3 in the eighth inning.
That closed the book on Guerra.
The Cougars peppered Sooner reliever Will Savage for three more runs in the ninth before John Brownell entered and gathered his second save.
“A little shaky out of the bullpen but John Brownell came in and did a good job to get us out of that,” Golloway said.
And the Sooners have at least one more game to play.
They face TCU at 1 p.m. today.
The winner advances to championship round and will have to win twice to win the regional.
John Shinn366-3536jshinn@normantranscript.com
OU Sports
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