After the UNC baseball program's 4-0 win over Holy Cross, No. 2 seed Oklahoma will face the Diamond Heels today, after (finally) beating No. 3 seed Nebraska last night.
Due to the weather delays last night and the late finish, the Saturday noon game slot was cancelled, and UNC and Oklahoma will now take the 6 PM EST slot. There is still a possibility of rain throughout the day in Chapel Hill, so this start time is aspirational.
2025 Season In Review
Overall Record: 35-20
Conference Record: 14-16 (12th in the SEC)
Home Record: 20-10
Away Record: 9-9
Neutral Site Record: 7-1
The SEC's reputation is doing some heavy lifting here. Oklahoma, which is in the bottom third of the conference, is a No. 2 seed despite having a losing conference record. The Sooners were helped by a non-conferene schedule that had them beat teams from the Big Ten (Minnesota), ACC (Virginia), and former PAC-12 (Oregon State). Other than that, OU has beaten up on a who's who of nobodies.
Meet the Manager
Skip Johnson
Tell me if you've heard this one before. School's former pitching coach takes over the program with great success. Seems like a good formula. Skip Johnson has been at the helm in Norman since 2017 and has guided the Sooners to a 229-153 record in that time, with a trip to Omaha in 2022, Oklahoma's first College World Series trip since 2010.
Key Players
Oklahoma sports a twin pitching duo. Fortunately for the Sooners, they were able to grab a win over Nebraska with the worse twin. North Carolina gets the ace.
Kyson Witherspoon is 10-3 with a 2.47 ERA (compare that to his brother Malachi, who is 3-8 with a 5.09 ERA). Kyson has thrown 120 strikeouts against just 20 walks, so the Diamond Heels will need to be opportunistic with their hitting, they're probably not going to get too many freebies.
Carmichael is Oklahoma's power threat. The junior catcher has sacrificed some base-hitting for better power this season, dropping his batting average by 45 points, but doubling his home runs from 7 to 14. Carmichael's slugging percentage has also gone up 25 points.
Perhaps more impressive, his strike outs have gone down (43 to 41 this season) and his walks have gone up (20 to 22). Usually when batters lift their power numbers, you'll see less walks and more K's as they start to swing more heavily. Carmichael has shown good plate discipline while spanking the ball.
Dylan Crooks is Oklahoma's closer, and he's a good one. In 24 appearances this season, he has 14 saves and only one loss. If the Sooners have a lead with Crooks on the mound, it will take nerves of steel to steal a win.
Crooks has a surprisingly generous strikeout-to-walk ratio of nearly 3/1 (31 K's, 9 BB's). A quarter of the hits he's given up are extra base hits, so if the Tar Heels can zero in on his looks, they can generate runs off of him. It's best to not let Oklahoma deploy him in a winning position, though.