Full Capacity: Is It Time for That? Politics or Not, I Have My Answer
STILLWATER – Quick, can you name the last athletic event to sell out at Oklahoma State University. The answer was nearly Sunday’s Bedlam and regular season finale in softball. In fact, if Cowgirls softball head coach Kenny Gajewski had his wish or if they counted the folks standing on the outfield corral and deck then they might have been able to call it a sellout.
“I wish they had gotten that out earlier,” Gajewski said of the school’s announcement that athletic crowds are now back to full capacity. “They seem to be more concerned about baseball. I wish they had got that out earlier.”
You can forgive Gajewski for grumbling a little bit. It was frustrating to see his team give up seven unearned runs and still hang in there, fight, scratch, and claw before losing to Oklahoma 11-8 and seeing the Sooners earn their ninth straight Big 12 regular season title on the Cowgirls diamond. There were 663 fans counted in the crowd for the Bedlam softball finale and Cowgirl Stadium has an official capacity of 750.
Doing some quick checking, the last sellout of an athletic event at Oklahoma State was the 2018 Homecoming game with Texas. The Cowboys return to Barry Sanders 1988 throwback uniforms saw 56,790 in Boone Pickens Stadium and they were able to celebrate a 38-35 upset of the first place in the Big 12, 6-1 overall, and No. 6-ranked Longhorns. There have been games with over 55,000 in the stands since, but not a technical sellout.
Gallagher-Iba has seen some large crowds with the most recent big ones being 8,129 to see a 73-61 win over Iowa State on Feb. 29, 2020 and then 6,983 to see a 69-63 win over Kansas State on Mar. 4, 2020.
Feb. 16, 2020 there were 7,070 wrestling fans inside GIA to see a 27-8 thumping of Oklahoma. Nick Piccininni scored a fall at 5:54 in his match against Christian Moody and Travis Wittlake scored a 19-4 tech fall over Elijah Joseph.
Good times!
Earlier this year while filling in for Rex Holt on Cowboy baseball on radio in Lubbock, I saw what I had not seen in over a year. Texas Governor Greg Abbott had just opened the state back up from COVID-19 restrictions. He and the State of Texas took a lot of backlash from the rest of the country and national leaders. On the Friday night and Saturday afternoon games Rip Griffin Park on the Texas Tech campus was packed. The box score shows 4,442 in attendance. All I can tell you is they were sitting cheek to jowl as Big 12 Commissioner Bob Bowlsby would say and there wasn’t a mask in sight. Cowboy baseball color analyst Matt “Chief” Davis and I looked at each other and smiled over seeing something we had forgot about, full crowds at sporting events.
I know there will be some people mad. Nothing like a pandemic and the ups and downs that come with it to polarize people. We live in a society that had forgotten how to laugh and where so many take everything so serious.
I’m not going to tell anybody else what they should do or how they should feel. I know that for the rest of my life I will wash my hands more frequently. I will go to the fist bump or shoulder bump before reaching out to shake a hand. I will be more careful with sharing my political views, but I will look forward to being among throngs of Oklahoma State fans at Cowboys and Cowgirls sporting events as often as I can.
I’ve had my vaccinations and I encourage others to do so as well. I don’t want to pick a fight with Dr. Fauci, but I feel good about the Oklahoma State decision and I plan on showing that support at either O’Brate Stadium or Cowgirl Stadium later this month as they are the only sports left with home dates. Yes, the Cowgirls will be hosting an NCAA regional and hopefully a super regional.