Published: April 04, 2008 12:38 am            

Changing history

It's been a long time since OU whipped Texas

NORMAN, Okla. — For better or worse, Oklahoma has always gauged itself against Texas in anything involving athletics. Football, basketball, badminton, it doesn’t matter what sport it is. The Sooners strive to be at the Longhorns’ level and preferably beyond.

A decade ago, the argument could be made on the baseball diamond, too. The Longhorns came to L. Dale Mitchell Park for an early May series in 1998 and were swept by the Sooners.

OU fans packed the ballpark at the time, bolstered by an overwhelming feeling victories against Texas were going to follow. But when OU opens a three-game series with the Longhorns at 6:35 p.m. today, that confidence will be based more on faith rather than any kind of recent success.

Over the last decade, things haven’t exactly been even on the baseball diamond.

The Longhorns have gone 527-188 in the nine seasons since, claimed four Big 12 Conference titles, advanced to the College World Series five times, and dogpiled at Rosenblatt Stadium twice.

OU, during the same span, is 327-252-2, has yet to hang a conference title pennant, made five trips to the NCAA Tournament, but none have yielded a trip to Omaha.

The amount of hardware collected is one way to gauge Texas’ decade of dominance over OU. The simplest, however, is their head-to-head records. Texas has won 24 of the last 30 meetings and won all nine of the series.

Hearing those statistics smacks those in the Sooner program like a right hook out of nowhere.

“Ten years is a long time,” said OU pitcher Michael Rocha, who will start Sunday’s series finale. “I was 9 years old. I don’t even remember anything when I was 9.”

OU coach Sunny Golloway wasn’t aware of it either. He was stunned to find out he was managing the first OU team to win a game at Texas’ Disch-Faulk Field since 1997 last season.

“I don’t put a lot of thought into that stuff because I’m always looking toward the future,” he said.

But it’s hard to believe OU’s baseball future can get much brighter without experiencing some success against Texas.

There’s really no way to rise without knocking a program from its perch. Texas has rested atop the Big 12 for most of the last 10 years. Its worst finish in the conference standings was sixth nine years ago. The Longhorns have taken the regular-season Big 12 pennant three of the last four years.

“If you want to get to the top, there’s usually someone sitting there. You have to remove them,” Golloway said. “They might not have been the sole champion of our conference, but they’ve been at the top or within the top three.”

The Longhorns (19-9, 5-4 Big 12) enter this weekend’s series in fourth place, but it’s still early in the conference race. It’s doubtful they’ll simply abdicate the throne.

The Sooners (21-8-1, 2-3-1) are alone in sixth, but see the three-game set as a chance to serve notice they intend to compete for a conference title and show that College World Series sign in left-center field at L. Dale Mitchell Park isn’t just for decoration.

In that sense, this should be one of the most pressure-packed series OU plays this season.

The crowds should be the biggest they’ve been all season and the atmosphere will be tinged with the excitement there always is when the two programs meet.

If the players don’t already understand, they’ll get a better sense when the empty seats they’ve played in front of all season are filled.

“There’s more focus, because they are Texas and you have little more adrenaline going. I’m not going to deny that,” OU center fielder Aljay Davis said. “You just have to execute and leave the emotions off to the side.”

For whatever reason, the Sooners haven’t been able to find a winning formula against Texas. But if they are to compete for and win conference titles and rejoin college baseball’s elite, one has to be found.

“If you want to win a Big 12 championship, you have to win a series like this,” Golloway said.



John Shinn writes for the Norman (Okla.) Transcript.

        

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