Watch: Oklahoma State Baseball Reacts to Hosting NCAA Regional
STILLWATER – Oklahoma State baseball found out they were hosting an NCAA Regional following the conclusion of the conference tournament games being played on Sunday afternoon/evening. They found on Monday morning they were the No. 11 overall seed in the tournament and would be hosting two rather familiar teams in Dallas Baptist, Oral Roberts and then Washington from the Pac-12.
The Cowboys have game two on Friday, June 2, as they’ll kick things off against Oral Roberts at 6 p.m. CT, with Washington taking on Dallas Baptist at 12 p.m. CT. (Game times are subject to change.)
“Lots of great regionals, I mean tremendous competition spread out throughout the entire 64-team pairing,” said Oklahoma State head coach Josh Holliday. “So, you know you’re gonna be engaged in a competitive tournament; ours is certainly competitive with our familiarity with Oral Roberts, having played them twice, Dallas Baptist twice and then Washington, a team we don’t know quite as much about, but obviously they were competing in the Pac-12 race all the way to the very end.”
It’s always fun to be present with the team as they’re watching the selection show. Not so much them finding out what seed they are, but rather what seeding other teams around the country and Big 12 receive and where and who those teams are sent and paired up with.
“My first initial thought is to get after it with Oral Roberts, take it day-by-day,” said Roc Riggio. “I think we’re in a great spot, this team is really coming together towards the end [of the season] and it’s special. Every good team talks about how their team is special, but the way we have competed together, fought back and overcome some losses, it shows a lot about this squad, this team and this coaching staff and this program. So, I think we’re in a good spot. No matter where we went, I’d say we’re in a good spot.”
However, with how the series against ORU has gone in recent years, this year’s selection show was rather interesting. But any way you slice it, the Cowboys have had a really solid end to the regular season, capped with a magical run through the Big 12 tournament, a performance which solidified a top-16 seed and a regional host for the Pokes.
“Very good tournament for sure,” said Holliday. “Definitely have some familiarity with those ball games; they were played at midweek, so you see each team’s midweek pitching alignment and this particular situation you’ll see the weekend alignment, which is a little different. So, we’ll go to work today on refreshing our memory and start lining up our gameplan, but I think it’s a great regional, I thought the whole [selection] show was highly interesting to see just how many good teams we’d come across. You see Vanderbilt and Arkansas there as national seeds and we opened up our season against them in the first three games. You just look at who you played across the entire season and how it all played out, it’s just interesting to see. We saw a lot of good baseball teams and played a great conference to prepare us for this. So, I’m excited, I feel good about it, thankful that we’re at home hosting, proud of our team for having earned that. I think the deep run we had in the conference tournament is what got us there and the magic the kids put forth as a team, believed in themselves to fight through the loser’s bracket is very meaningful.”