For OU softball, road to SEC title 'is going through Austin' vs. Texas

NORMAN — Patty Gasso doesn’t need to sell what’s waiting this weekend in Austin. She’s been there. She’s felt it.

And she knows exactly what her team is walking into at Red & Charline McCombs Field. No. 2-ranked Oklahoma softball heads to face No.

4 Texas — the defending national champions — in a three-game series that already feels like late May or early June. In recent years, this matchup has doubled as a preview of the Women’s College World Series. So this week, the Sooners have practiced accordingly with artificial crowd noise in order to create extra chaos and try to simulate what’s ahead.

"This is really important for me to see how tough we are, because this is not an easy environment,” Gasso said. “This will be the toughest place that we have played. We played at LSU.