Here’s why Wichita State baseball will open season vs. Oklahoma Sooners in Texas
Update (Noon Wednesday, Feb. 17): The WSU-OU baseball series has been canceled because of weather. Details available here.
Don’t get Eric Wedge wrong, he would have loved for his Wichita State baseball team to open the season at Eck Stadium in front of Shocker fans.
But when winter weather forecast for this weekend forced WSU to cancel its season-opening series at home against Northern Colorado, Wedge believes it may have been a blessing in disguise.
The Shockers will now open the season against No. 23 Oklahoma at Dell Diamond in Round Rock, Texas with a doubleheader on Saturday starting at noon and single game on Sunday at 1 p.m. Game one is slated for seven innings, while the final two games are slated for nine innings.
It is not yet known if streaming options will be available, but tickets are on sale at RRExpress.com.
“We’re always looking to play at home and we wanted to play Northern Colorado, but we didn’t feel comfortable with the weather,” Wedge said. “We had this opportunity to go down to Texas and play Oklahoma and wow, what a great opportunity. We always want to play in front of our fans, but to play a team that’s ranked with a very storied history, I’m pretty excited.”
Because of strict guidelines in place for teams during the coronavirus pandemic, scheduling the typical mid-week games against teams like OU were near impossible for WSU this season. Wedge even commented on it after the Shockers released their schedule, saying he wished they could play more of the regional rivalries against major programs.
So when WSU made the decision this past weekend to cancel its season-opening series at home against Northern Colorado, WSU director of baseball operations Loren Hibbs went to work on finding a replacement.
Cold weather also forced the Sooners to cancel their season-opening series at home for this coming weekend.
Although the availability aligned, Wedge said that the only reason WSU was able to make the series work was because of Hibbs.
“Scooter (Hibbs) has been working overtime when it comes to the schedule this year,” Wedge said. “It’s just the contacts and the respect that other coaches and other teams have for him. That’s the reason why we’re here at all. It has nothing to do with me or anybody else. It’s all Scooter. He’s the one doing all of the work behind the scenes, so kudos to him and kudos to OU for them wanting to play.”
With an entire week left of practice before the season begins, Wedge still wants to evaluate his team before making a final decision on the weekend rotation and lineup.
For now, he’s just excited that the Shockers have added three games against a nationally ranked team.
“It’s very exciting any time you get the chance to play a competitive team with a ranking like OU early in the season,” Wedge said. “That’s only going to help us get better. We’re appreciative of the opportunity and we’re excited to get the chance to compete against another good team this early in the season.”
This story was originally published February 15, 2021 at 2:32 PM.
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