Tide Lineup Knocks Out Witherspoon

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — Friday night, Oklahoma hoped to pick up an SEC road series opener victory over Alabama off the back of one of the best starting pitchers in collegiate baseball, Kyson Witherspoon.

Entering Friday, Witherspoon possessed an ERA of 1.80, one of the lowest marks in the country, and 58 strikeouts, placing him at No. 3 in the nation just behind FAU's Trey Beard and Tennessee's Liam Doyle, who both entered the weekend with 62 punchouts.

With a big challenge in front of them Friday evening, the bell was rung, and the Crimson Tide answered.

In Witherspoon's four innings of work Friday evening, the right-hander allowed four runs (three earned), three extra-base hits, and three walks, all totaling or tying a season high against Witherspoon.

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When asked about how his lineup attacked Witherspoon Friday, Alabama head coach Rob Vaughn had nothing but praise for the uber-talented righty.

"It's not an accident, that guy is who he is," Vaughn stated, "Skip Johnson is also one of the best pitching coaches in the country. And he just happens to be the head coach over there. It's electric, man, it's an upper 90s heater that just holds there, the velo doesn't fall off. Even at 85 pitches, he's still throwing the ball 97 miles an hour with some carry. It's a really good cutter, it's a really good slider. He didn't use the up-and-down breaking ball a lot tonight. He didn't throw a lot of good changeups, but he threw one to get Do (Will Hodo) on a good spot, the changeup is in there. It's just five pitches. I thought we just kind of grinded him out a little bit."

Vaughn would go on to add, "There were some unselfish at-bats in there, some tough at-bats. That's what you gotta do. You're gonna get, I told these guys in the pregame, you're probably gonna get against an arm like that, you might get two chances throughout the game to chalk up a run. And when you do, you gotta do it. Shoot, we got the double in the first from Kade, we get that chance and we don't quite cash in there. But just proud of the way we grinded him out. It's real, man, that's real, real stuff. He out-pitches people."

Witherspoon's four-inning start was his shortest start of his 2025 campaign by a full inning.

The Crimson Tide batting order is no stranger to elite arms; just last week, Alabama faced Liam Doyle, who is regarded as one of the nation's best pitchers. Against the southpaw, the Alabama lineup rattled off six hits, six runs, five earned runs, four walks, and two doubles — all of which remained season-highs against Doyle entering this weekend.

To the benefit of the Crimson Tide batting order, they got a good start from their guy on the mound Friday, Zane Adams. The southpaw threw 101 pitches over four innings of action, allowing two runs and four hits while punching out four Sooners to set up the Crimson Tide for the win.

"Zane Adams, just competing his tail off," said Vaughn as he opened his press conference following Friday's win, "didn't have the cutter early, the changeup was floating early, didn't have the curveball much any of the day. They were spoiling pitches, spoiling pitches, spoiling pitches. Starters, their job is to give us a chance to win, that's what Zane did."

No. 12 Alabama eyes its first SEC home series win Saturday at noon against No. 9 Oklahoma.

For more Alabama Baseball, Basketball, and Football content from Simon Besnoy, follow him on Twitter at @SimonBesnoy and stay tuned to Tide1009.com for daily news.