Oklahoma State University Athletics
Bases Loaded: Cowgirls Roll Through Regionals
May 20, 2019 | Cowgirl Softball
STILLWATER – It was intense, it was competitive and it was everything you would've hoped for from the first NCAA Regional hosted in Stillwater since 1998 this past weekend. The Oklahoma State softball team picked up three wins, all of them by three runs or less, and put on a show for a rowdy fanbase starved for postseason success.
With those three wins, OSU secured its first super-regional berth since 2011, and will now face No. 4 Florida State in Tallahassee with the winner of a best-of-three series earning a trip to Oklahoma City and the Women's College World Series next week. First though, we take a look back at the biggest talking points of the weekend.
FIRST BASE: Fearless Freshmen
OSU freshmen Chyenne Factor and Kiley Naomi have been instrumental in the Cowgirls' success in 2019, and the Pokes would likely have wrapped their season up if not for the performances of the two Big 12 All-Freshman Team honorees. This was especially evident during their NCAA Tournament debuts last weekend.
Factor, a Yukon, Oklahoma, native, delivered a go-ahead grand slam in the sixth-inning of the Cowgirls' 13-10 win over Tulsa in last Friday's winner's bracket game to put OSU within one win of its first regional title since 2011. The in-state product led the Pokes with five hits during the Stillwater Regional.
Naomi, meanwhile, racked up four hits over three games, including a 2-for-3 day that saw the Maurice, Louisiana, native bag a double down the left-field line and then scored the go-ahead run in the Cowgirls' 2-1 win over the Golden Hurricane. She also stole two bases to cement her standing as the Big 12's second-most productive base stealer this season.
These two young guns have been stalwarts of the OSU lineup this season despite their inexperience, and will be cornerstones of the program in the coming years.
SECOND BASE: Springfield Delivering in the Clutch
There are many who deserve credit for Oklahoma State's immense 2019 season. One could point to Samantha Show's home-run heroics or dynamic performances in the circle. You could also tell stories about the continued greatness of Rylee Bayless and Madi Sue Montgomery. But perhaps the most important contributor this season has been Sydney Springfield and her innate ability to produce in clutch moments.
Springfield, a transfer from LSU, has delivered time and time again, often doing so as a substitute off the bench. First, she hit two home runs, including a walk-off two-run shot, to help the Cowgirls down No. 13 Kentucky on opening weekend. Then, the pinch-hitting extraordinaire produced a game-tying two-run triple against No. 13 Texas Tech in Stillwater, followed by a go-ahead two-run single off the bench against No. 8 Texas in the Phillips 66 Big 12 Softball Championship.
The right-handed hitter forced her way into the starting lineup during the Stillwater Regional, and again she delivered.
This time, it was a go-ahead RBI single into center field that scored Kiley Naomi and pushed the Cowgirls in front of Tulsa, 2-1, in the regional final. It ultimately served as the game-winning run and Springfield's efforts throughout the season have helped the Pokes return to the super-regional round for the first time since 2011.
Interestingly enough, this year will mark Springfield's third-straight super-regional trip to Tallahassee, as she competed there in the past two seasons while at LSU.
THIRD BASE: Montgomery's Milestone Moments
Madi Sue Montgomery continued to cement her legacy as not only one of Oklahoma State's most successful competitors, but as one of the Big 12's elite as well, this past weekend. After driving in two runs during the Stillwater Regional, Montgomery's career total sits at an OSU-best 201 RBI. She is the sixth player in league history to drive in at least 200 runs, and is the first non-Sooner to do so.
Her first run batted in opened the scoring for the Pokes in the Stillwater Regional, as her RBI single in the first inning against BYU helped OSU get off to a running start. She also notched an RBI double that tied the Cowgirls will Tulsa at 1-1 in Saturday's regional final. The double was Montgomery's 50th career two-base hit, making her just the sixth player in Big 12 history to hit at least 30 home runs and log at least 50 doubles.
Montgomery's historic standing among Big 12 competitors is further cemented when looking at the full picture, as she is one of only two players to reach all three of those marks (31 HR, 50 2B, 201 RBI). The only other Big 12 competitor to do so is Oklahoma's Sydney Romero.
HOME PLATE: A Poetic Finish
Normally when we get to home plate, we're looking ahead to next week. Don't worry, we'll have plenty of focus on Tallahassee in the coming days, because this week we instead chose to look back at the poetic finish to the Cowgirls' regional championship victory on Saturday.
After some late drama where the Cowgirls thought they had turned a double play, only for the umpires to reverse the call, Tulsa managed to put the game's tying run 60 feet away from home plate with two gone in the inning.
It was then that senior transfer Samantha Show induced a pop-up from Tulsa's Tori Stafford, and the ball, which seemed to hang in the air for minutes, finally came to rest in the glove of Madi Sue Montgomery just beyond the edge of the infield dirt.
Montgomery has been an instrumental figure in OSU's reemergence as one of college softball's elite programs over the past four seasons. She has played in all 238 games of Kenny Gajewski's tenure as head coach, and shattered numerous records to help bring the Pokes along (just look up a base for confirmation of that).
She, along with others like Taylor Lynch and Vanessa Shippy, have helped reroute the program and have it pointed back toward the summit of college softball. With that story already written, it was only fitting that in Montgomery's final game at Cowgirl Stadium, she was the one to record the final out that secured her team's first super-regional berth since 2011.
Sports often have a way of creating magical moments that live on in time. With all that Montgomery and others have done for the OSU softball program, it was a fitting, and poetic, end to her career at Cowgirl Stadium and the true mark of new era for one of college softball's most historic teams.
With those three wins, OSU secured its first super-regional berth since 2011, and will now face No. 4 Florida State in Tallahassee with the winner of a best-of-three series earning a trip to Oklahoma City and the Women's College World Series next week. First though, we take a look back at the biggest talking points of the weekend.
FIRST BASE: Fearless Freshmen
OSU freshmen Chyenne Factor and Kiley Naomi have been instrumental in the Cowgirls' success in 2019, and the Pokes would likely have wrapped their season up if not for the performances of the two Big 12 All-Freshman Team honorees. This was especially evident during their NCAA Tournament debuts last weekend.
Factor, a Yukon, Oklahoma, native, delivered a go-ahead grand slam in the sixth-inning of the Cowgirls' 13-10 win over Tulsa in last Friday's winner's bracket game to put OSU within one win of its first regional title since 2011. The in-state product led the Pokes with five hits during the Stillwater Regional.
Naomi, meanwhile, racked up four hits over three games, including a 2-for-3 day that saw the Maurice, Louisiana, native bag a double down the left-field line and then scored the go-ahead run in the Cowgirls' 2-1 win over the Golden Hurricane. She also stole two bases to cement her standing as the Big 12's second-most productive base stealer this season.
These two young guns have been stalwarts of the OSU lineup this season despite their inexperience, and will be cornerstones of the program in the coming years.
SECOND BASE: Springfield Delivering in the Clutch
There are many who deserve credit for Oklahoma State's immense 2019 season. One could point to Samantha Show's home-run heroics or dynamic performances in the circle. You could also tell stories about the continued greatness of Rylee Bayless and Madi Sue Montgomery. But perhaps the most important contributor this season has been Sydney Springfield and her innate ability to produce in clutch moments.
Springfield, a transfer from LSU, has delivered time and time again, often doing so as a substitute off the bench. First, she hit two home runs, including a walk-off two-run shot, to help the Cowgirls down No. 13 Kentucky on opening weekend. Then, the pinch-hitting extraordinaire produced a game-tying two-run triple against No. 13 Texas Tech in Stillwater, followed by a go-ahead two-run single off the bench against No. 8 Texas in the Phillips 66 Big 12 Softball Championship.
The right-handed hitter forced her way into the starting lineup during the Stillwater Regional, and again she delivered.
This time, it was a go-ahead RBI single into center field that scored Kiley Naomi and pushed the Cowgirls in front of Tulsa, 2-1, in the regional final. It ultimately served as the game-winning run and Springfield's efforts throughout the season have helped the Pokes return to the super-regional round for the first time since 2011.
Interestingly enough, this year will mark Springfield's third-straight super-regional trip to Tallahassee, as she competed there in the past two seasons while at LSU.
THIRD BASE: Montgomery's Milestone Moments
Madi Sue Montgomery continued to cement her legacy as not only one of Oklahoma State's most successful competitors, but as one of the Big 12's elite as well, this past weekend. After driving in two runs during the Stillwater Regional, Montgomery's career total sits at an OSU-best 201 RBI. She is the sixth player in league history to drive in at least 200 runs, and is the first non-Sooner to do so.
Her first run batted in opened the scoring for the Pokes in the Stillwater Regional, as her RBI single in the first inning against BYU helped OSU get off to a running start. She also notched an RBI double that tied the Cowgirls will Tulsa at 1-1 in Saturday's regional final. The double was Montgomery's 50th career two-base hit, making her just the sixth player in Big 12 history to hit at least 30 home runs and log at least 50 doubles.
Montgomery's historic standing among Big 12 competitors is further cemented when looking at the full picture, as she is one of only two players to reach all three of those marks (31 HR, 50 2B, 201 RBI). The only other Big 12 competitor to do so is Oklahoma's Sydney Romero.
HOME PLATE: A Poetic Finish
Normally when we get to home plate, we're looking ahead to next week. Don't worry, we'll have plenty of focus on Tallahassee in the coming days, because this week we instead chose to look back at the poetic finish to the Cowgirls' regional championship victory on Saturday.
After some late drama where the Cowgirls thought they had turned a double play, only for the umpires to reverse the call, Tulsa managed to put the game's tying run 60 feet away from home plate with two gone in the inning.
It was then that senior transfer Samantha Show induced a pop-up from Tulsa's Tori Stafford, and the ball, which seemed to hang in the air for minutes, finally came to rest in the glove of Madi Sue Montgomery just beyond the edge of the infield dirt.
Montgomery has been an instrumental figure in OSU's reemergence as one of college softball's elite programs over the past four seasons. She has played in all 238 games of Kenny Gajewski's tenure as head coach, and shattered numerous records to help bring the Pokes along (just look up a base for confirmation of that).
She, along with others like Taylor Lynch and Vanessa Shippy, have helped reroute the program and have it pointed back toward the summit of college softball. With that story already written, it was only fitting that in Montgomery's final game at Cowgirl Stadium, she was the one to record the final out that secured her team's first super-regional berth since 2011.
Sports often have a way of creating magical moments that live on in time. With all that Montgomery and others have done for the OSU softball program, it was a fitting, and poetic, end to her career at Cowgirl Stadium and the true mark of new era for one of college softball's most historic teams.
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