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Oklahoma stuns Arkansas, rallies from 5 runs down with walk-off HR in SEC Tournament
By Paul Harvey
Published:
Oklahoma softball is truly one of the dominant entities in all of college athletics. However, the Sooners had their backs against the wall in Friday’s SEC Softball Tournament semifinals.
Through the top half of the 3rd inning, Oklahoma was trailing by 5 runs with Arkansas racing out to a 6-1 lead. Kailey Wyckoff punctuated the hot start by the Razorbacks with a 2-run home run before eventually handing the ball to ace Robyn Herron out of the bullpen.
When Herron entered the game in the 5th inning, Arkansas was clinging to a 6-4 lead after the Sooners began clawing back into things. All 4 Oklahoma runs to that point came off of solo home runs, but the power barrage was not done yet.
Ailana Agbayani homered in the bottom of the 6th inning to make the score 6-5, where things stood in the bottom of the 7th with 2 runners on for Oklahoma. Freshman Gabbie Garcia then stepped to the plate, and she went right to work, swinging at the first pitch.
With that swing, Garcia blasted a walk-off 3-run home run, sending Oklahoma to the SEC Tournament title game with an 8-6 victory, dramatically completing the epic comeback.
According to Tyler McComas on X (formerly Twitter), teams were 0-81 in the SEC Tournament when trailing by at least 5 runs. The Sooners flipped that on its head by blasting 6 total home runs to erase the deficit.
Oklahoma advances and will face the winner of Texas vs. Texas A&M from the 2nd semifinal to be played on Friday evening. Saturday’s title game is set for 7 pm ET on ESPN.
Paul Harvey lives in Atlanta and covers SEC football.
