OU Opens SEC Play with Top-25 Series vs. A&M

NORMAN – No. 9 OU (15-2) opens Southeastern Conference play in Norman this weekend, welcoming No. 22 Texas A&M (15-1) to Kimrey Family Stadium for the first time since 2011. Friday's opener is slated for a 6:30 p.m. CT first pitch before a 4 p.m. start Sunday and 2 p.m. finale on Sunday. The series can be seen on SECN+ and heard on 99.3 FM/1400 AM The REF.

The Sooners are coming off a three-game series sweep of Santa Clara in Norman last weekend and a 6-1 Wednesday win over UT Arlington at Kimrey Family Stadium.

Oklahoma made a three-spot jump in the ranks this week, moving into the top 10 at No. 9 in the D1Baseball Top 25 and ranking as high as No. 7 (Baseball America) across the five major polls. OU's national attention comes after a dominant start to the season, including an opening weekend that saw the team take the crown at the Shriners Children's College Baseball Showdown.

On the season, OU is outscoring opponents 158-51 and the pitching staff has a team ERA of 2.96 with 182 strikeouts to 54 walks. The Sooners started the season with a program-record seven straight games scoring double digits and have scored 10+ runs in nine of 17 games.

OU enters its second season as members of the SEC in 2026. In its inaugural season the program went 14-16, winning five of 10 conference series and advancing to the quarterfinals in the Sooners' first appearance at the SEC Tournament in Hoover, Ala.

FOR THE FANS

• Promotions abound for SEC Opening Weekend at Kimrey Family Stadium this weekend.

• All weekend will be Military Appreciation Weekend in Norman, featuring challenge coin giveaways for active and veteran service members.

• Friday will feature Happy Hour where fans can purchase $4 16 oz. beer from gates open up until first pitch. Also Friday will be the return of postgame Friday Night Fireworks for conference weekends. Sunday promos include Sooner Sunday 4 Pack where families can take advantage of four tickets, four hot dogs, four sodas and a large popcorn starting at $40.

• Sunday will also be Sunday Fun Day at the ballpark where kids can run the bases postgame and get autographs from the team.

• Reserved tickets for this weekend's series are officially sold out. Limited standing room only tickets will be available at the front gate on game days on a first-come, first-served basis.

• Students and fans unable to get a ticket inside the ballpark are allowed to sit on the outfield berms. Students are encouraged to gather on the berm beyond left field.

• Season and single game tickets for the 2026 season are available now on SoonerSports.com/tickets. For more information about Oklahoma baseball tickets, contact the OU Athletics Ticket Office at 405-325-2424, by email at outickets@ou.edu or by visiting SoonerSports.com/tickets.

• Oklahoma Baseball officially opens the newly-named Kimrey Family Stadium this season after a Board of Regents resolution in the fall of 2025 approved the renaming of L. Dale Mitchell Park in honor of the Kimrey family and their transformational gift to the program. Also approved were numerous renovation projects, including updates to the outfield wall, batter's eye, bullpens, exterior fence and spectator areas beyond the outfield wall.

• Project 2 of the Kimrey Family Stadium Project has officially moved forward, featuring significant expansion and improvements to team facilities, seating bowl upgrades and fan enhancements, including new concessions, restrooms and a dedicated fan plaza.

OPPONENT OUTLOOK

• Oklahoma and Texas A&M have a competitive history on the baseball diamond with matchups dating back as far as the 1940s. Since 1975, OU narrowly leads the series 36-34. In the Big 12 era, the Sooners edged the Aggies 23-22.

• In Omaha in 2022, the teams met twice with OU besting A&M by final scores of 13-8 and 5-1 as Oklahoma finished the year as the national runner-up.

• The 2026 Aggies come to Norman at 15-1 and No. 22 in this week's D1Baseball top 25. They are coming off a 14-1 run-rule win over Stephen F Austin on Tuesday in College Station and team has impressive wins over Virginia Tech (10-0 [7]) and Arizona State (9-3).

• The Aggies rank in the top 10 in the country in batting average (9th, .344), on-base percentage (6th, .474) and slugging (6th, .612). The pitching staff's 2.95 team ERA sits at 11th in the country and fifth in the SEC.

• Veteran outfielder Caden Sorrell paces the team with a .407 batting average and eight home runs. On the mound, Sunday starter RHP Aiden Sims leads the group with a 1.59 ERA and 25 strikeouts to five walks.

ON THE BUMP

• A season after losing his weekend rotation to the draft, including Friday night starter and first-round pick Kyson Witherspoon, OU head coach and pitching guru Skip Johnson's retooled staff is off to an exceptional start on the bump.

• OU's weekend rotation of LHP junior Cameron Johnson, RHP junior LJ Mercurius and LHP freshman Cord Rager have combined for 88 strikeouts to 17 walks and 13 ER on the year.

• The Sooners' Friday night guy, Johnson, is 3-0 and has registered at least seven strikeouts in all four of his starts on the year and has two games with zero walks allowed.

• UNLV transfer LJ Mercurius who was a part of the USA Baseball Collegiate National Team this past summer, has transitioned smoothly to Oklahoma in his Saturday starter role. Mercurius has been one of the best pitchers in the country to start 2026, holding a 0.39 ERA that ranks eighth in the country and No. 1 in the SEC.

• Mercurius' 34 strikeouts rank 12th in the country and third in the league. In his OU debut on opening weekend vs. Oklahoma State, the righty fanned 12 OSU batters while allowing just one run on three hits.

• Mercurius' perfect 4-0 record in four starts ranks tied for first in the nation for victories and has thrown one complete game, a seven-inning one-hitter vs. Gonzaga on Feb. 28.

• Sunday starter and freshman Cord Rager out of Maypearl, Texas, has 22 K's to just six walks on the season with a 2-1 record.

• Along with the starting pitching, OU's bullpen has been stellar. Senior transfer Jackson Cleveland has taken on a closer role with three saves on the year to rank third in the SEC. The Miami transfer has seven appearances and has struck out eight in his eight innings. Sophomore transfer Kadyn Leon has made six appearances and allowed no runs in 9.0 IP to go with nine strikeouts and one walk.

• Junior Jason Bodin, who made 31 relief appearances in 2025 to rank second in the SEC, has made five appearances in 2026 and has 11 strikeouts in nine innings. He struck out a career-best six in three innings in his most recent outing vs. Santa Clara (3/8).

• Seventeen arms have seen the mound for Coach Skip Johnson, with four pitchers outside the weekend rotation making at least one start.

• The staff's 2.96 team ERA ranks 12th in the country and sixth in the SEC. The group's 1.08 WHIP ranks ninth in the nation.

• The OU arms have already registered four shutouts in 2026, eclipsing the three total the team had in 2025.

IN THE BOX

• Through 17 games OU is outscoring the opposition 158-51 (9.3 runs/game). The offense is batting .310 with 61 extra-base hits to opponents' 28.

• All seventeen Sooners that have made a plate appearance this season has registered a hit.

• Junior transfer Deiten Lachance paces the team with a .404 batting average, registering a hit in 15 of 16 games played. Five Sooners that have started at least 10 games are batting over .300 (Lachance, Brendan Brock, Trey Gambill, Camden Johnson, Jaxon Willits). Brock leads OU with four home runs while Gambill has a trio of long balls. Nine Sooners have combined for 18 blasts.

• The Sooners have homered in 10 of 17 games.

• OU ranks third in the SEC with six triples so far on the season.

• The team started the season with a program-record seven straight games scoring double digits and have scored 10+ runs in nine of 17 games.

• Plate discipline has been key to the OU offense as the Sooners rank third in the country and first in the SEC in walks drawn with 122. Five Sooners have recorded 10-plus walks, led by senior Trey Gambill's 16 and Jaxon Willits' 15.

RANKINGS CHATTER

• After a clean sweep of Santa Clara last weekend, the Sooners vaulted into the top 10 as high as No. 7 in the Baseball America Top 25. D1Baseball put the Sooners at No. 9 Monday, while Perfect Game ranks the team ninth, NCBWA 11th and the USA TODAY Coaches Poll 11th.

• OU is 1-0 in ranked matchups following its takedown of then-No. 10 TCU on Opening Weekend. A season ago, OU went 11-15 in ranked matchups.

UP NEXT

• After spending an undefeated opening weekend at Globe Life Field in Arlington, the Sooners will wrap up a 16-game homestand with the A&M series this weekend at Kimrey Family Stadium.

• OU plays its first true road game Tuesday in Hammond, La., meeting Southeastern Louisiana at 6 p.m. CT.

• Following the midweek matchup, OU will swing down to Baton Rouge for its second weekend of conference play, March 19-21, vs. the reigning national champs and 13th-ranked LSU.

• The series at Alex Box Stadium will be OU's first trip to LSU since a Super Regional matchup in 2013 that saw the Tigers beat the Sooners to advance to Omaha. OU most recently met the Bayou Bengals in 2022, a 5-4 LSU win in 11 innings.

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