Oklahoma Begins Title Defense With Storako
Top StoriesOklahoma waited all of a weekend to launch its bid for a national championship three-peat, once again landing one of the most decorated player available in the transfer portal.
Former Michigan All-American Alex Storako will join the Sooners next season while pursuing graduate studies, the pitcher tweeted Monday.
This past season at Michigan, Storako went 25-8 with a 1.71 ERA and 300 strikeouts in 200.1 innings and received first-team All-Big-Ten honors. A season earlier, the right-hander went 22-3 with a 1.05 ERA and 270 strikeouts in 146 innings and was the Big Ten Pitcher of the Year.
Storako joins an increasingly long list of Oklahoma transfers in the circle, following the likes of Paige Lowary, Giselle Juarez and Hope Trautwein. Ever since leaning, by her own admission, too heavily on Kelsey Stevens (70 percent of the team’s 2014 innings) and a freshman Paige Parker (61 percent of the team’s 2015 innings), Gasso has tried to utilize a deeper pitching staff. She has regularly turned to experienced transfers for that depth.
| Pitcher | OU debut | W-L | ERA | WHIP | K/7 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kelsey Stevens | 2014 | 38-9 | 2.44 | 1.13 | 7.3 |
| Paige Lowary | 2017 | 16-3 | 1.53 | 0.80 | 5.8 |
| Giselle Juarez | 2019 | 28-4 | 1.39 | 0.72 | 10.1 |
| Hope Trautwein | 2021 | 22-1 | 0.77 | 0.78 | 8.7 |
| Alex Storako | (at UM 2021) | 25-8 | 1.71 | 0.90 | 10.5 |
In replacing Trautwein, Storako joins a pitching staff that currently still includes reigning NFCA Freshman of the Year and first-team All-American Jordy Bahl and rising junior Nicole May.
Oklahoma’s recruiting class also includes two well-regarded pitchers, lefty Kierston Deal from North Carolina and lefty SJ Guerin from Texas. Some analysts rank Deal as the nation’s No. 1 recruit.