KU players told to ‘flush it’ after 8-1 loss to OU in Game 1 of Super Regional
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- KU lost the Super Regional opener to Oklahoma 8-1 at Hoglund Ballpark.
- Voegele allowed three home runs and seven runs (three earned) in 4 2/3 innings.
- KU must beat OU Sunday and again Monday to reach the College World Series.
Kansas Jayhawks baseball coach Dan Fitzgerald kept his postgame talk with his players rather brief after KU’s 8-1 loss to the Oklahoma Sooners in Game 1 of an NCAA Super Regional on Saturday night at jam-packed Hoglund Ballpark.
“I told the guys, ‘You’ve got from here to the foul line to flush it and be ready to go tomorrow,”’ Fitzgerald said after the Sooners (37-22) of the SEC snapped the 45-17 Jayhawks’ six-game winning streak in rather dominant fashion.
The lopsided loss — which left the fourth-year KU coach preferring to look ahead rather than behind — means KU must defeat OU in a 5 p.m. Sunday contest and then topple the Sooners again on Monday in order to gain a berth in next week’s College World Series.
OU would advance to the CWS by defeating KU again Sunday or, if KU wins Sunday to force a Game 3, with a win on Monday.
Oklahoma slugged three home runs off KU starting pitcher/ace Dominic Voegele Saturday, including a three-run blast by Dayton Tockey two batters after shortstop Tyson LeBlanc booted a fourth-inning ground ball that, if fielded cleanly, could’ve resulted in a double play and kept the score 1-0.
Instead, OU held a healthy 4-0 advantage in the fourth inning.
Voegele also gave up a pair of homers (to Trey Gambill and Camden Johnson) in the fifth. The 6-foot-2 junior’s line read 4 2/3 innings pitched, seven runs (three earned), three strikeouts one walk.
“His stuff was good. He’d probably like to have a couple pitches back,” Fitzgerald said. “The double play ball probably gets us out of the inning … that’s baseball. They strung it together after they got a hit more than we did.”
KU committed three errors to OU’s one. OU out-hit KU 11-4.
“I watched him pitch as a freshman, too, and he’s really good,” OU coach Skip Johnson said of Voegele. “That guy’s going to be a great pro when he goes on to pro baseball. Nothing ever seems to bother him. He made one mistake and that’s the game of baseball. Sometimes you hate it for that. Sometimes you love it if you are on the other side.”
Getting out-pitched and out-hit and outplayed in the field left Fitzgerald little choice but to focus on Game 2 of this best-of-three set. He was ready to move on from what he and a record Hoglund Ballpark crowd of 4,415 (that included several hundred Sooners fans) had just witnessed.
“There was belief that we were going to come back until the very end,” Fitzgerald said. “I hate to admit probably at some point in the postseason we were going to have to persevere through a loss. Here’s our opportunity.
“Tough to go undefeated in the postseason. I couldn’t be more proud of our team in how these guys compete, prepare and how they’ll be ready for tomorrow.”
KU on Sunday will face a second freshman starter in as many days. OU’s Xander Mercurius (0-2, 6.18 ERA) will go against KU sophomore Mason Cook (5-1, 4.23).
“We’re going to come back ready to play. The focus is on tomorrow. We’re going to come and get ‘em tomorrow,” said KU rightfielder Jordan Bach. He homered in the eighth to account for the Jayhawks’ only run.
One of the keys to the Sooners’ victory Saturday was the dominant performance of Rager, a 6-foot-6 235-pound native of Maypearl, Texas, who struck out six and walked one in improving to 5-3 this year.
“Tip the cap to OU. Their starter did a really nice job,” Fitzgerald said. “He was outstanding and we couldn’t get our leadoff guy on and get in a groove offensively. He has massive extension and did a nice job mixing. He executed and we couldn’t get any rhythm.”
OU coach Johnson liked the poise of the first-year player.
“I mean, you get in this arena — and they played in this arena last week in this environment (KU went 3-0 at regional at Hoglund) — and he was pounding the strike zone,” Johnson said. “They hit some balls really hard right at our guys too.
“(He was) just trying to stay in the moment, execute pitches. You can’t get too high or too low. Stay in the moment and think about what you want to happen not what you don’t want to happen.”
Johnson shared his message to his team ahead of Sunday’s second game of the series.
“Just let me stay out of the way, keep believing in each other.” he said. “Our team, the environment was incredible. You can see it kind of excites me, because I saw that at the University of Oklahoma as well. Our fans were incredible today, and their fans were incredible.
“He (Fitzgerald) is building something, and from me knowing Dan, like I know Dan, he’s a great coach, and really happy for him, and happy for Lawrence, because he’s a really good coach, and I think the things that he continues to do here are going to be special.”
This story was originally published June 6, 2026 at 10:39 PM.
