After an opening Saturday that gave CWS fans two blowouts, Father’s Day Sunday turned into a soggy game of wait-and-see.
The action at Rosenblatt Stadium was finished around 10:30 p.m. Sunday evening, a normal end time for a day featuring 1 p.m. and 6 p.m. games. However, torrential rains and frequently lightning strikes forced the South Carolina-Oklahoma game to start at 5:24 p.m., more than 4 hours behind schedule.
Once the game started … it stopped again. A two-hour delay in the middle innings forced both teams back into the clubhouses, and sent more than 22,800 fans at the ‘Blatt scattering back to their cars.
When play resumed for good, about 4,000 people watched the Sooners withstand 8th and 9th inning rallies by the Gamecocks to post a 4-3 win. Leading 3-2 heading into the bottom of the 8th inning, and after thwarting South Carolina’s bases loaded threat in the top of the inning, Oklahoma got a surging solo home run by Garrett Buechele to add an insurance run. The Sooners would need it, as the Gamecocks brought home one run on a bases loaded walk by Jackie Bradley in the 9th to cut the lead to 4-3. But Ryan Duke got the following batter, Adrian Morales, to fly out on the first pitch to end the game with the bags full.
Oklahoma advances to a winners bracket game against either Arizona State or Clemson. That contest was originally scheduled for 6 p.m. Sunday night but instead is supposed to start at 10 a.m. Monday morning. As for South Carolina, the Gamecocks head to the losers bracket. As Ron Morris points out, since the CWS went to a two bracket format in 1988, only two teams (USC in 1998, Oregon State in 2006) have won the national title after losing their first game.