Oklahoma State Softball Looks to Rebound in Their Stillwater Regional

STILLWATER – Oklahoma State may have been one and done in the Big 12 Tournament for the second season in a row, but what they did with their resume throughout the regular season, including the Bedlam series win over OU in Norman on the final weekend of regular season play, earned the Cowgirls a national seed.

Oklahoma State Cowgirls Softball

Stillwater Regional

The Cowgirls (44-10) are the fifth overall seed, meaning if they advance in their regional starting this Friday, May 17 at Cowgirls Stadium, then they will be back in Stillwater the next week for an NCAA (best two-out-of-three) Super Regional to earn the trip to Oklahoma City and Devon Park for a fifth-straight appearance in the NCAA Women’s College World Series. 

The Cowgirls will open up on Friday with Northern Colorado (27-24), the Big Sky Champion. Northern Colorado is the four seed in the regional. Friday afternoon Michigan (41-16) of the Big Ten will play Kentucky (30-22) of the SEC. Michigan is the No. 2 seed in the regional and Kentucky is the No. 3. 

The Cowgirls learned their path in the NCAA Tournament in the usual resting place where they reset in Broken Bow, Okla. 

“(I’m) just really, really excited to have this opportunity for the fourth straight year,” head coach Kenny Gajewski said from Broken Bow, Okla. with his team. “I told our team this is so hard. It’s not easy to do what they’ve done. You have to earn these things. You don’t get them handed to you. There are no favors.”

Northern Colorado will open against the Cowgirls and this season they lost to Big 12 teams Texas Tech and Iowa State (twice). They also lost to Michigan, another team coming to Stillwater and they lost to the Wolverines twice. 

“I know nothing about Northern Colorado tonight,” Gajewski said of the first round opponent. “By tomorrow I’ll know a lot more.”

Michigan beat Northern Colorado twice, beat No. 4 seed Florida twice, lost to No. 6 seed UCLA, and like the Cowgirls beat Wisconsin.

Kentucky beat No. 8 seed Stanford twice, and like Oklahoma State and Michigan they beat Wisconsin. A common opponent with the Cowgirls, Kentucky beat South Dakota State. They lost to Washington, lost to LSU in all three games of a series, Lost all three games to Florida in a series, but they beat Georgia in two-out-of-three games. 

“I had a feeling that we’d get Kentucky,” Gajewksi said. “As we were sitting in there and watching everything kind of unfold, I was like ‘I think we’re gonna get Kentucky.’ Michigan was kind of a wildcard to see them pop in there. They’ve played really, really good softball as of late, winning the Big Ten Tournament.”

© BRYAN TERRY/THE OKLAHOMAN / USA TODAY NETWORK

Lexi Kilfoyl is 21-3 on the season.

Oklahoma State features two potential All-Americans in pitcher Lexi Kilfoyl, the pitcher of the year in the Big 12 Conference with a 1.14 ERA, fourth best in the nation. Kilfoyl is tough to hit with a mixture of heat and some dynamite breaking pitches that seem to melt into the dirt. Oklahoma State also has one of the best power hitters in the country in catcher Carolina Wang that leads the team in virtually every hitting category including batting average (.373), OPS (1.153), hits (60), home runs (17) and RBIs (47).  

The other national seeds are as follows:

Oklahoma State advances to the second week and the Super Regional and they will be matched with the winner of the Fayetteville Regional, hosted by Arkansas (36-16). The Lady Razorbacks host No. 4 seed in the opener Southeast Missouri State (28-24). The other opener in that regional is No. 2 seed Arizona (34-16-1) vs. No. 4 seed Villanova (31-22).

Oklahoma State did not play Arkansas or any of the team in either the Stillwater or Fayetteville Regionals. The Cowgirls did go 12-5 overall against teams in the NCAA Tournament this year including two wins against the No. 1 seed Texas and the No. 2 seed Oklahoma. Oklahoma State also beat the No. 4 seed Florida and the No. 6 seed UCLA. The Cowgirls losses to NCAA teams include once to both Texas and Oklahoma. They also lost to Georgia and LSU out of the SEC.

Here is the schedule for Stillwater on Friday, May 17.

Stillwater Regional – Stillwater, Oklahoma

Friday, May 17

No. 5 seed Oklahoma State (host) vs. Northern Colorado | 5:30 p.m. ESPN+

Kentucky vs. Michigan | 3 p.m. ESPN2