OKLAHOMA CITY - What do UF, UCLA, Alabama, Texas A&M, Arizona State and Virginia Tech have in common?
They were six of the eight teams in the Women's College World Series.
But more importantly, they each had a first-team All-American pitcher.
Of the six pitchers who made the list, every last one of them led their team to Oklahoma City.
Alabama is the only one of those schools with two All-American pitchers. Freshman Kelsi Dunne made the third team for the Crimson Tide and handled the majority of her team's innings, but sophomore first-teamer Charlotte Morgan - the nation's RBI leader - posted the lowest ERA on her team.
The large number of supremely talented hitters who dug in at Hall of Fame Stadium over the last week only made the importance of a team's pitcher more apparent.
The Gators posted the highest run total by a team in a single game when they scored six against the Aggies. When the Gators built a 4-1 lead in that game, A&M coach Jo Evans pulled her All-American Megan Gibson to save her for game two.
In 2007, there were two extra-inning games at the WCWS. UF's 1-0 loss in nine innings was the third extra-inning game the Gators played in Oklahoma City and the second that went scoreless into the ninth.
The incredible strikeout totals are another testament to the high level of pitching.
UF struck out 327 times over the course of the season. Thanks, in part, to Angela Tincher's 19-strikeout performance - one short of the WCWS record - the Gators piled up 15 percent (49) of those in World Series play.
"We're definitely trying to break the College World Series strikeout record, that was one of our goals coming in," UF coach Tim Walton joked. "Unfortunately, it was for our pitchers."
Look no further than the championship series to determine what wins titles.
Aggies ace Megan Gibson is the Big 12 Pitcher of the Year and Sun Devils ace Katie Burkhart is the Pac-10 Pitcher of the Year. So far the edge goes to Burkhart as ASU beat Alabama 3-1 on Monday night.
