OU Baseball: Sooners Drop Game 2; Decisive CWS Final Set for Monday

OMAHA, Neb.  – Oklahoma (42-23) had its nine-game winning streak snapped with a 6-2 setback to No. 5 North Carolina (54-13-1) in game two of the best-of-three championship series at the College World Series before a sellout crowd of 24,621 on Sunday afternoon at Charles Schwab Field.

The outcome forces a winner-take-all showdown for the national title at 6 p.m. Monday night on ESPN.

OU had outscored opponents 92-32 during its season-long winning streak that included two NCAA Tournament victories each over No. 2 Georgia Tech, No. 3 Georgia and No. 15 Kansas, plus an opening-round CWS victory over No. 7 Alabama and a 9-3 championship series triumph over UNC on Saturday.

The Sooners’ sizzling bats put up two runs in the first but were held scoreless the rest of the way. The OU pitchers combined for 15 strikeouts but permitted nine walks.

On the heels of the Sooners’ victory on Saturday, UNC won its 11th straight game this season following a loss.

OU freshman righty Xander Mercurius (1-3) dominated the Tar Heels in the first two innings. His first seven pitches were strikes, which included multiple changeups in the low 80s and a 96-mph fastball. Mercurius struck out the side in the first – two batters went down looking and the other was retired on a check swing. In fact, UNC’s first six outs came via strikeouts.

“That’s the trick in baseball is not to get away from your game plan and start trying to punch guys out and kind of lost it a little bit,” Sooners coach Skip Johnson said. “Instead of just trying to throw the ball to the target, he’s trying to pinch people out. And that happens. No different than we kind of get off our game plan going pitch to pitch. We’ve done a really good job over the last couple of weeks with it. And we’ll learn from it. And that’s a good thing.”

For the eighth straight game, OU scored first, jumping out to a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the first inning.

Junior centerfielder Jason Walk led off with a single to center, pushing his hitting streak to 14 games and marking the 22nd consecutive game he has reached base.

Junior third baseman Camden Johnson followed with a four-pitch walk. Walk stole third and Johnson stole second on a throwing error by the catcher, which allowed Walk to score from third.

Junior shortstop Jason Willits doubled with a 109-mph line drive off the wall in right-center to score Johnson and make the score 2-0. It was Willits’ 10th hit in the CWS, setting a school record for an OU player.