Set to take their reserved seats at the college women’s softball World Series

Augustin Ruiz and family are having an adventure in O-K-L-A-H-O-M-A, where it’s now college softball time. He’s the head baseball coach at St. Michael’s, his wife, Sonya, is the head girls’ basketball coach of the Lady Horsemen, and along on the trip are their three young daughters.

But for them, its softball time. Sonya had ordered the tickets via online, then came the ride to Oklahoma where they were to be seated in  Oklahoma City’s prestigious ballpark for the annual women’s World Series. Their location is Section 206, Row H.

“We’re checking out Oklahoma City now, taking a tour,” Augustin said. “We got to listen to Oklahoma’s first round game on the radio here against Northwestern yesterday, and having a grand time.”

Well, at least the Ruiz quintet was tuned in. Here in Santa Fe, there was the usual, nothing mentioned in the local daily newspaper except the World Series schedule box that had the time of the opening game pairing Texas with UCLA, but no times on the next three.

But the local daily didn’t forget the college baseball boys.

It will be quite some time before the hardball, white stitched balls reach their annual World Series played in Omaha, Neb., the ladies are still overlooked with a pair of loser’s bracket games today, and two winner’s bracket games Saturday, and where the boys are not in Fort Lauderdale or Daytona Beach, but on the pages of the local daily here in the City Different.

That’s right, the 64-school field was unveiled today, long in print and taking up more space with even an advance story. Can someone get a life here, a wake-up call?

Heck, I’ve paid daily attention to the softball news, written it up every day for my interested readers. On Thursday, 9th-seeded Northwestern of the Big Ten thought it won the entire thing when its player hit a solo home that just cleared the glove of the Sooners’ left fielder at the fence in the top of the second inning.

When the Wildcats calmed down in the stands and their dugout, the lead was wiped out quickly when in the bottom of the frame, up stepped top-ranked, defending champion Oklahoma to piece together six runs that included the first of two grand slams.

But the first game was where the Big 12 began to dominate. Unseeded Texas stunned 11-time national champion UCLA 7-2 after taking a 5-0 lead. And two games later, it was 7th-seeded Oklahoma State, the third of the three Big 12 teams in the Elite Eight field, kept the conference unbeaten by advancing past unseeded Arizona, 4-2.

The Pac-12 also had three teams in the hunt, but had the opposite results. Boom, boom, boom down went the Bruins, down went unseeded Oregon State against 14th-seeded Florida, 7-1, down went unseeded Arizona in double-elimination play.

Now the new World Series rule penciled in for the girls has the winning teams getting a day off, so while the Longhorns, Sooners, Gators and Cowgirls are off today, UCLA, Northwestern, Oregon State and Arizona will take the field at the OGE Energy ballpark and must survive or pack up and hit the road.

Here you go, UCLA (48-9) against Northwestern (45-12) at 5 p.m., and next comes Oregon State (39-21) versus Arizona (38-21) at the scheduled time of 7:30, and both can be seen on ESPN2.

Meanwhile, on goes Texas (44-19) with upsets over Mississippi State, Washington, and now getting past UCLA for the first time. Back in April, the Longhorns also defeated the Sooners, 4-2.

Now they again meet up with Oklahoma, which is presently at 54-2, at 1 p.m. Saturday on ABC, and at 5 p.m., it’s Florida (49-17) facing Oklahoma State (47-12).

But after Friday’s losers are done, the field drops to five.

Four games are then slated for Monday at 10 a.m., 12:30 p.m., 5 p.m., and 7:30 p.m., all on ESPN. The championship series will begin Wednesday in a best-of-3. Last year, the Sooners dropped game one against Florida State and then won the next two.

But this time, the 2nd-seeded Seminoles bowed out in the first round against Mississippi State, which then lost to Texas, which is still in the hunt.

And the Ruiz folks, have a ball.