WOMEN'S COLLEGE WORLD SERIES / SEMIFINALS
OKLAHOMA 6, FLORIDA 5 (8 innings)
WHAT HAPPENED: Oklahoma centerfielder Jayda Coleman blasted a solo home run to start the bottom of the eighth inning and the No. 2-seeded, three-time reigning NCAA champion Sooners handed fourth-seeded Florida a 6-5 walk-off defeat in their elimination game Tuesday in the Women's College World Series semifinals at Oklahoma City.
Coleman's game-winner, off UF freshman iron woman Keagan Rothrock, came after the Sooners, seeking an unprecedented fourth consecutive national title, rallied from a 5-2 deficit with two runs in the fourth, the game-tying run in the sixth, then the dramatic homer in the eighth in front of the partisan OU crowd at Devon Park.
The Gators built their three-run lead on a trio of homers off ace lefty Kelly Maxwell(22-2), but the Oklahoma All American shut UF down after that, surrendering no hits and allowing just four base-runners (three on walks, one on an error) the last 5.1 innings. Meanwhile, Rothrock, the only pitcher to start any of UF's 13 postseason games, had to work around a lot of OU traffic in the late innings and the Sooners, the No. 2 hitting team in the nation at .362, finally broke through.
The big-fly fireworks began early, with UF catcher Jocelyn Erickson, the 2024 SEC Player of the Year who won a NCAA title as a freshman outfielder with the Sooners last season, hit a two-run homer in the top of the first. The lead was short-lived. OU, having faced Rothrock(33-9) for seven innings less than 24 hours earlier in a 9-3 Gators victory, answered with a two-run shot to center from Ella Parker in the bottom of the first to tie the gameat 2-2 after just three batters. In the Florida second, it was another two-run homer, this one by freshman Ariel Kowalewski after Ava Brown's lead-off walk, that gave the Gators a 4-2 advantage.
An inning later, it was 5-2 whenReagan Walsh cranked her team-best 19th of the season, a roped line drive that just cleared the left field wall. The homers continued in the fourth, with OU's Cydney Sanders, two batters after a Kasidi Pickering lead-off single,popping one high and over the center field wall to cut the UF margin to 5-4.That's how it stood until the sixthwhen Avery Hodge, with one out, doubled down the right-field line and scored two batters later on Parker's two-out single that tied the game 5-all and set the stage for the late-game heroics for the Sooners and heartbreak for the Gators.
PLAY OF THE GAME:Coleman's walk-off, of course.
IN THE SPOTLIGHT:Thank you, Skylar Wallace, for three magnificent seasons of softball and being the consummate ambassador for Florida women's athletics. Your "Gator Great" place in the UF Hall of Fame awaits.
STAGGERING STATISTIC:Oklahoma (54-7), which will play current Big 12 and future SEC rival Texas (55-8) in the best-of-three NCAA championship series starting Wednesday, is a combined 230-15 the last four seasons. That's a winning percentage of .939. The Sooners, if anyone forgot, went 61-1 last season.
NOTABLES:
- The Gators ended the 2024 season with a third-place finish at the Women's College World Series. It's the highest finish in program history since the team was national runner up in 2017.
- UF's 54-15 record is the program's 11th 50-win season in history and it's most recent since the 2018 season.
- Florida's nine starters in the batting lineup each hit at-least one home run in the NCAA Tournament this season.
- The program as a whole hit nine home runs, seven against Oklahoma across two games, at the Women's College World Series, which is the most since UF hit 11 home runs in the 2014 WCWS.
- Florida's infield starters consisted of four freshmen, a sophom*ore and a graduate senior, which was the youngest starting infield at the WCWS this season.
- The Gators setsingle-season records foron base percentage (.439), runs scored (520), doubles (112), RBI (493) and lowest stolen base percentage against (.409 | 9-for-22).
- Individually, Skylar Wallace set UF career records in batting average (.410), slugging percentage (.789), on base percentage (.560) and stolen bases (119), while also finishing in the top 10 in several other offensive categories.
- She also set the UF single-season record for runs scored (90), total bases (152)
- Jocelyn Erickson set UF's single-season record for lowest stolen base against percentage (.316) as she only allowed six stolen bases on 19 attempts.
UP NEXT:For Florida (54-15), another season ends in OKC, which is always the penultimate goal. The ultimate one was not achieved, but consider where the Gators were a year ago -- eliminated in the 2023 NCAA regional round (on the road, no less) -- to where they finished in 2024 with a pitching staff of almost exclusively freshmen. UF loses Wallace, one of the greatest players in program history, as well as Katie Kistler, Avery Goelz, Baylee Goddard and Emily Wilkie, but the incoming freshman class (again) will be one of the nation's best, led by three of the top five prospects in the nation. And there's also the transfer portal, where Coach Tim Walton last summerplucked Erickson and NFCA All-American outfielder Korbe Otis, who led the league in hitting, and where he figures to go hunting is for a big-time veteran pitcher.
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