Hartford's Mistakes Give Oklahoma Series Sweep

The Oklahoma Sooners trailed Hartford, but capitalized on pitching issues late in the game to pull off the series sweep of the Hawks 8-3 Sunday.

Oklahoma trailed 3-1 heading into the bottom of the sixth, but pitching miscues from the Hawks let the Sooners back into the game.

Freshman Hunter Lockwood started the scoring flurry for OU, hitting a leadoff home run to cut the deficit to just one run. Two batters and two outs later, Max White reached on a scoring error allowing the run to start.

Garrett Carey and Chase Simpson both drew walks in the next two at-bats to load the bases, forcing Hartford to replace Sean Newcomb with Ryan Lukach, but he fared no better. Lukach hit the first batter he faced, bringing Max White home, tying the game. Lukach walked the next two batters, scoring Carey and Simpson to take a 5-3 advantage.

The pitching woes continued to nip the Hawks in the bottom of the eighth, solidifying the Sooners lead.

After back-to-back walks and a wild pitch loaded the bases, Matt Oberste hit a sacrifice fly to right center to bring Ty Taylor home to push the lead to three runs. Jack Mayfield scored in the next at-bat on a wild pitch and Ross came home on a double-steal in the next at bat, putting the Sooners ahead 8-3.

Steven Okert (1-0) was credited with a win for the Sooners, giving up three earned runs on nine hits, striking out nine in his eight innings pitched. Newcomb (0-1) received a loss for the outing, giving up one hit and five runs –one earned – in 5.2 innings of service.

The Sooners will be back in action at 3 p.m. Tuesday against Texas-Arlington, before taking to the road for a three-game series against New Mexico.