This weekend Vandy goes down to Norman, Oklahoma to take on the Sooners in a battle of two evenly-ranked teams with very different momentum.

Vandy sits at 25-8 (7-5) and is ranked as the number 17 team in the country per D1 Baseball. Oklahoma is 23-9 (5-6) and is ranked number 19. That’s about as even as two teams can get with regard to record and ranking, but the sentiments surrounding each team is very different. Vandy has won 5 straight games and is coming off of their first ever sweep of Florida in Gainesville, whereas Oklahoma has lost their last 4 games and was swept in dominant fashion by LSU despite being in Norman. They also got dominated by unranked Dallas Baptist in their midweek game.

Oklahoma’s team composition is not too different from Vandy’s but they have a few notable strengths and weaknesses relative to the Commodores.

Any discussion about Oklahoma has to start with Kyson Witherspoon. The junior right-handed pitcher was an All-American last year and has only improved this year. He has posted a 2.4 ERA in 45 IP with 68 strikeouts and only 11 walks. He has a WHIP below 1.0 and is an ace in the truest sense of the word. He is currently considered a frontrunner for SEC pitcher of the year and most certainly will be a first round draft pick in the 2025 MLB draft. Behind Witherspoon is a good bullpen but some below average starting pitching. Out of the pen expect to see Gavin Jones, Dylan Crooks, Reid Hensley, and James Hitt play a big role. They have 4.22, 1.37, 2.41, and 2.65 ERAs, respectively, and are heavily utilized in the 2nd and 3rd games of series.

As previously mentioned, despite an otherwise strong pitching staff Oklahoma’s Saturday and Sunday starters have struggled. Both Cade Crossland and Malachi Witherspoon have more losses than wins on the season and have 7.06 and 5.06 ERAs respectively (both are worse than any Vandy starter). It’s unlikely that Vandy will be able to get to Witherspoon early (nobody has thus far), so it’s even more crucial to make Saturday and Sunday’s games against lesser pitching count. The earlier Vandy can run off one or both of the starters those days, the better.

While the pitching staff is by no means bad, nor have they struggled greatly, the same cannot be said for Oklahoma’s offense. While they are averaging just under 6 runs per game in the SEC, a respectable number, this has been padded by explosive performances against South Carolina and Mississippi State, both of which do not have good pitching staffs. Against ranked SEC teams, they are only averaging 3 2⁄3 runs per game, and only scored 4 runs the whole weekend against LSU (whose pitching staff is statistically worse than Vandy’s).

All that being said, Oklahoma does have a few talented hitters in their ranks, most notably Trey Gambill. He is hitting .338 with 28 walks to only 11 strikeouts on the year and an OBP of .505. While his power numbers are not great, he is an elite contact hitter. Behind him are Kyle Branch, Jaxson Willis, and Easton Carmichael. Branch is another contact guy hitting .319 while Carmichael and Willis are Oklahoma’s best power hitters (with 6 and 8 home runs, respectively). Behind these four the rest of the players are producing similarly, hitting between .260-.280 with only moderate power production. Oklahoma actually only has 8 more home runs and fewer doubles than Vandy on the year despite playing in a much more hitter-friendly park than Hawkins. Vandy pitching has really only struggled against power-heavy teams like Arkansas and done very well against teams that rely on contact and stringing together hits over power. Look for Vandy to try and navigate those top 4 batters carefully and force the bottom of the lineup to beat them.

The first thing I’ll be looking at for Vandy this weekend is the use of the bullpen beyond Sawyer Hawks and their Sunday starter. After 2 solid starts against Arkansas and Texas A&M Connor Fennell moved to the bullpen in exchange for Brennan Seiber against Florida. His bullpen outings went okay, as he got the save on Saturday but then gave up 2 back-to-back homers on Sunday. Comparing the performances out of the pen to when starting, as well as looking at what Seiber gave with his start, I think Corbin would be well served to put him back in a starting role. He can go longer than Seiber, and has not given up more than 2 runs in any start he has had this year.

The other major player factoring into this key is Miller Green. Green was the closer for this roster for the first half of the season but after a string of tough results he was transitioned to a more traditional relief role against Florida. He did well on Friday and to start on Saturday before getting pulled after loading the bases. We know Green can perform better than he has been, it’s just a matter of figuring out what role gets him to do so.

The next thing I will be watching for is the lineup, particularly about whether Colin Barczi and Riley Nelson will play as well as if there is any change in the DH spot. According to Corbin, Nelson was a healthy scratch in Tuesday's midweek game. We don’t know why this is, and hopefully he will not be out for an extended period of time, he has been one of Vandy’s most productive hitters in SEC play. Barczi also did not play and while it is not necessarily out of the ordinary for a catcher to get a break in the midweek games, the fact that he did not DH gives some pause (although an explanation could be coming later). Finally, Mac Rose has been Vandy’s DH for the majority of SEC play and, frankly, he’s been bad. He is hitting .194 in conference and striking out just shy of 40% of the time–an egregiously bad number. That production just won’t do and for the first time in a while we saw Tim Corbin insert Jayden Davis in the DH spot against Florida. Davis got a hit in 2 ABs against the Gators and then DHed again against Dayton in the midweek. I suspect that Tim Corbin made sure that he could get some ABs in the midweek so that he could put him in the lineup instead of Rose this weekend (this would also explain Barczi’s absence).

Momentum is a very real thing in baseball and a team’s mental soundness is crucial to their performance. Oklahoma has gotten thoroughly walloped in their last 4 games and has only scored 5 runs in the last week. On the other hand, Vandy is coming into Norman with newfound confidence and a top 3 pitching staff in the conference (yes, statistically that is true, believe it or not). If Oklahoma is not able to win their Friday night game, I would consider predicting a sweep in favor of the ‘Dores. I do think, however, that Vandy will really struggle against Witherspoon and leave the door wide open for Oklahoma to win on Friday, thereby changing the whole series.

Ultimately, though, I think that Vandy emerges victorious from this battle of top 20 opponents. The ‘Dores have the superior pitching staff overall and a proven track record against contact-first teams. The two offenses are, on paper, almost exactly the same but the ‘Dores have been hitting much better than the Sooners as of late. I predict that Vandy wins the series 2-1 to move to 9-6 in SEC play and put themselves in strong contention to host a regional.