OU Softball: Oklahoma HC Patty Gasso 'Anxious' But Optimistic For Sunday's Game

Very few Sooners on the 2025 squad were on the team in 2024, when OU won the national championship for the fourth year in a row.

Kasidi Pickering and Ella Parker are the only starters from last year’s squad in Oklahoma City this time around. Nelly McEnroe-Marinas, OU’s starting third baseman, was on the roster a year ago but missed the entire 2024 season with an injury.

While Oklahoma ultimately swept Texas in the 2024 WCWS championship series, the Sooners faced adversity en route to the title.

The Sooners, after winning their first two games, lost to Florida, forcing a win-or-go-home game for a berth to the championship series. They persevered past the speed bump, beating Florida 6-5 in extra innings to set up the Red River battle for the title.

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“We're just ready to come out and compete again,” Parker said. “We're ready.”

And while Parker hit a three-run walk-off home run to edge Tennessee 4-3 in OU’s 2025 WCWS opener, Gasso draws parallels between the adversity in that game and the Sooners’ current situation.

“They were in the same position,” Gasso said. “I mean, they literally were in the same position two days ago. So we talked about how this is not uncommon right here. We've been here. We know how to come back.”

Oklahoma went undefeated in the postseason in 2023, but that wasn’t the case in the Sooners’ 2021 or 2022 title runs.

The Sooners actually lost their WCWS opener in 2021 — the first year of OU’s title streak — against James Madison, rallied, dropped a game against FSU in the championship series and eventually won two straight to earn the crown.

OU lost to UCLA in 2022, forcing a win-or-go-home semifinal game, which it ultimately won.

Though less comfortable than seasons like 2023 when the Sooners never faltered in the postseason, setbacks like Saturday’s have previously helped Oklahoma become the dynasty that it is.

“It is going to mean the world because it's going to take us into the next couple of years,” Gasso said. “So these young players are feeling this and they'll be able to preach it to the new ones that are coming in. I can't tell you how proud I am of what this group is doing and how they've gotten here, and I just am really anxious to see how they go forward.”