Some Lexi Kilfoyl appreciation: No softball player in the state had a better season

The Oklahoma State ace led the Cowgirls to unexpected heights after massive upheaval.

OKLAHOMA CITY — As Kenny Gajewski and his Oklahoma State softball players sat in the interview room late Thursday night, I knew I was supposed to be looking at whoever was talking.

That's unspoken reporter protocol in press conferences — focus on the speaker.

But my eyes kept drifting to Lexi Kilfoyl.

The Cowgirl ace was there in the bowels of Devon Park, but the look on her face told me that her mind was elsewhere. Maybe back on the field where she'd given up only two hits to Florida's powerful offense but had lost the game. Maybe replaying the pitch that had been blasted over the right-field wall for the game's only run.

Or maybe she was thinking about the road ahead at the Women's College World Series. Stanford and hard-throwing national player of the year NiJaree Canady awaited Friday, and then, if OSU survived, the Cowgirls would have to win three consecutive games in two days to avoid elimination and make the championship series.

Whatever was running through Kilfoyl's head in those moments, the result was a glassy, defeated look.

There was another memorable time I saw such a look: Klay Thompson after Game 4 of the 2016 Western Conference Finals. He and the Golden State Warriors had just been drubbed in back-to-back games in Oklahoma City by the Thunder.

Thompson looked cooked.

Of course, when the series shifted back to OKC for Game 6, he hit a playoff-record 11 3-pointers, almost single-handedly beating the Thunder and propelling the Warriors to an eventual series victory.

All that to say, I wasn't sure how Kilfoyl would pitch Friday against Stanford.

Sadly for OSU, the answer wasn't good.

Stanford hit Kilfoyl as hard as any opponent this season, clubbing two home runs and scoring four runs on her in 3 2/3 innings. Her struggles exacerbated an OSU offense that went into a funk in Oklahoma City. No runs. Only one extra-base hit.

Stanford's 8-0 run-rule victory eliminated OSU.

Ended Kilfoyl's college career, too.

Despite how poorly it ended, I hope everyone will take a moment to appreciate Kilfoyl. She had the best season of any college player in the state, and I'm not just talking about her stats. No other player, not a Sooner, not a Cowgirl, carried as big a load as well as Kilfoyl did.

Yes, her numbers were great: 26-5 with a 1.20 earned run average, allowing opponents to hit only .173 and surrendering only 25 extra-base hits in 180 2/3 innings.

But dig deeper, and the backstory makes her performance even more impressive.

For starters, OSU pitching coach John Bargfeldt left the program after last season. He was the pitching coach who Kilfoyl signed on with when she transferred from Alabama to OSU only a year earlier.

Then, a few weeks later, Kelly Maxwell decided to transfer and would eventually land at OU. Kilfoyl and Maxwell pitched together all last season, and by all accounts, they were close and were expected to share the load this season.

The Cowgirls were already losing a group of talented seniors. The likes of Chyenne Factor, Kiley Naomi and Rachel Becker would be gone.

Suddenly, Kilfoyl found herself as the undisputed leader of a largely rebuilding team while also taking on the new role of ace and adjusting to a new pitching coach in Carrie Eberle.

It was a lot.

Kilfoyl didn't flinch.

"Lexi is a leader like I haven't seen before," Cowgirl catcher Caroline Wang said. "I'm not sure that anyone watching the games from the outside could see it either, the person that she is to this team.

"Honestly, just a rock."

Kilfoyl's calm, stoic demeanor can make it appear that she's detached.

Does she even care?

"But she cares the absolute most," center fielder Jilyen Poullard said, "and there's no doubt about that. You can ask any girl on this team; Lexi's heart is always there, always in it, although she doesn't show a whole lot of emotion."

The result: a season the likes of which no one in Stillwater was expecting.

A series win against eventual No. 1 national seed Texas? A series win against OU, the three-time defending national champ, in its new stadium in Norman? A No. 5 national seed?

Another trip to the WCWS?

All of that seemed like a pipe dream for OSU before the season started.

And when Cowgirl coach Kenny Gajewski decided to part ways with hitting coach Whitney Cloer and promote Vanessa Shippy-Fletcher right before the season started, it added even more uncertainty.

But Kilfoyl's excellence on the mound and leadership in the clubhouse showed the rest of the Cowgirls the way. They followed her lead. They rose to her standard. In the process, they had one of the best seasons in program history.

"I talk to a lot of kids; they constantly tell me, 'I want to be the ace' — until it gets hard," Gajewski said. "She never ran from hard. She just embraced that."

Perhaps the only time she didn't this season was after Gajewski lifted her from Friday's game against Stanford. Watching Kilfoyl talk to the coaches in the circle, you could tell she wasn't upset with their decision to insert Ivy Rosenberry. No doubt Kilfoyl knew she didn't have her best stuff.

But as she walked to the dugout, head hanging, shoulders slumping, she wiped at her eyes.

Her sadness and disappointment was clear.

And for a while, she exited the OSU dugout, going back into the hallways and the locker-room area under the stadium. But Gajewski went to find her.

"Your teammates need you out here," he told her. "I need you out here."

So, Kilfoyl returned to the dugout. She joined in the cheers and chants. She talked to fellow pitcher Ivy Rosenberry between innings. She did what she could.

Even when it was a struggle.

"You have to keep embracing the hard," Gajewski said.

Lexi Kilfoyl did that all season, even until the bitter end.