NORMAN — After four years of leaning on a spectacular class of young athletes that evolved into an undeniable group of leaders, Oklahoma coach Patty Gasso this year is learning a little more about the 2025 team — and maybe about herself as a coach — all the time.
As the ’25 Sooners were extending their perfect record to 14-0 — continuing a 17-game unbeaten streak that was started by the likes of Jayda Coleman and Kinzie Hansen and Tiare Jennings and Nicole May, etc. — Gasso wasn’t entirely sure what to expect last weekend as the Sooners returned to the friendly confines of Love’s Field for the first time.
Because, in some ways, Love’s Field wasn’t all that friendly in its debut season.
Gasso called it “more petrified” as she recalled opening college softball’s finest stadium literally during the 2024 season. As talented and as experienced and as successful as that team was, migrating from a comfortable lifestyle at Marita Hynes Field to Love’s Field for games just felt different.
“It’s the fans,” Gasso said. “There’s so many of them that it is a little bit, like, jaw-dropping at times for some of them. But I think they handled it really well.”
More than 12,000 fans turned out at both stadiums for the Norman Tournament over the weekend as Tulsa, Bowling Green and Abilene Christian staged contests, with probably more than 90 percent of those showing up exclusively for OU’s games at Love’s Field.
It just felt different than the 2024 event as Miami, Liberty and Louisiana came to town. MHF was still the Sooners’ home as construction crews raced all season to piece together Love’s Field in stages. OU survived the opener 9-7 against Liberty, then lost the finale 7-5 to Louisiana. There were three run-rules in between, but there was a unique tension.
“We had more at stake last year with winning streaks and all kinds of things going on,” Gasso said. “I don’t know, it was just it was something we’ve never felt before. We felt a lot of pressure last year, from what I remember.”
A big part of that pressure came from never having been on Love’s Field to suddenly playing games there — literally from never having stepped foot on the playing surface to one day hosting actual games. Clinging to three straight national championships and a 67-game winning streak (which eventually reached 71) only added to it.
That external pressure led to some rocky performances by a team that was, simply put, the best in the history of the sport and proved it by going on to win its fourth consecutive national title.
So even though this year’s roster is replete with true freshmen and arrivals from the transfer portal, Gasso said already calling Love’s Field their home and spending an entire offseason getting to know the facilities and amenities and sightlines and quirks — as well as the energy that an OU home game now generates — has helped this team settle in much quicker than what the 2024 Sooners experienced.
“We’re very excited to be home,” Gasso said, “but it’s not easy to throw somebody out there in front of 4,200 people. When we were playing our Battle Series (in the fall) in front of 1,000 — and that was big for some of these guys; some of our freshmen have not probably been in front of crowds bigger than 2-300 — so you could feel it.”
“We’ve been playing in this. We played in this in the fall, all fall. So it’s not as new to us as it was last year. Last year was, I mean, the first time we played on it, we were playing a game against an opponent.”
Love’s Field has thus changed the usual dynamic for OU softball in another way. Instead of spending a week in sunny Southern California at the Mary Nutter Classic playing high-stakes games against quality opponents in front of big crowds, the Sooners spent last week at home battling ice and snow and freezing temperatures and playing low-stress pre-conference games against middling opponents — but still in front of big crowds.
“I was then crossing my fingers, because this is Mary Nutter weekend, and we did miss going to that,” Gasso said. “I know our players kind of like it. It’s very expensive, though, so it was a risk of saying, ‘Can Oklahoma … just watching the — what was it, 100 hours of like, freezing temps? And I’m like, Oh.’ ”
Gasso said the grounds crew’s tireless work to get the fields ready from arctic conditions was “amazing,” that “everyone was pitching in,” and that the whole scene may have created a different kind of “team effort” and “supportive” bond for everyone in the program.
“It was great to see how many Sooner fans were in the stands,” said pitcher Kierston Deal. “Like, even with the cold, they’re sticking with us. Like, all the way through it. So I think just being able to have these freshmen play early in the season with this home crowd, they’ll be able to get prepared and used to it, kind of as the season progresses.”
“I would just say there’s no stress,” said outfielder Kasidi Pickering. “Last year’s team had a lot of outside factors going into the (season). The games we played last year in that stadium were pretty tough. So knowing we can go into this (weekend), having the Battle Series experience on the field, it was easier to play this game without as much stress about outside factors.”
The end result was a 4-0 weather-adjusted weekend with three easy wins, two run rules and an unexpected, extra-inning test — and a jump on this year’s team settling in quickly for a challenging inaugural season in the SEC.
“I think it definitely helps,” Gasso said. “Because it was really — what we were doing last year and shuttling from Marita Hynes was very unsettling. The things that we had to do — and you can’t go out on the field yet. We’re walking on the field, but we’re not playing on the field. These kinds of things. So it took us a little bit of time to get used to it, and they were uncomfortable. But yes, I think this team, they don’t care. They’ve already felt it enough that it’s pretty easy for them.
“You don’t know what you don’t know, and we’re just going to keep it right there, just let them go out there and not really think about what’s at stake.”