Sooners Trio Earns All-America Honors
NORMAN, Okla. – University of Oklahoma softball standouts Amber Flores (Calexico, Calif.), Keilani Ricketts (San Jose, Calif.) and Jessica Shults (Valencia, Calif.) were named to the 2010 National Fastpitch Coaches Association All-America second team the organization announced today. The honor is the third career award for the senior Flores and the first for the freshmen Ricketts and Shults. All three were previously named to the All-Big 12 and All-Central Region first teams this season.
Shults led the Sooners in batting average as a freshman, hitting .364 with 64 hits and 62 runs driven in, the fourth-most in a single season at OU. Her 15 home runs tied for the team lead and were the most by a freshman and tied for eighth on the single season list. Her .676 slugging percentage and .469 on-base percentage were second-best on the team, while her .993 fielding percentage was tops among starters.
Flores led the team in slugging percentage (.712) and on-base percentage (.541). The two-time Big 12 Player of the Year ended her career with 56 home runs, tying for the Big 12 career lead. Her 15 long balls this season tied for the team lead. Batting just in front of Shults in the lineup, Flores plated a run for every hit recorded by OU’s clean-up batter. Flores drew 43 walks and was hit by a pitch 20 times.
Ricketts led OU with a 32-10 record in the circle this season and posted a 1.24 earned run average. Ricketts threw 29 complete games, including 14 shutouts. She allowed 46 earned runs and 91 walks in 259.2 innings pitched. Her 346 strikeouts are the second most in a single season at Oklahoma as she averaged 9.34 per seven innings. She held batters to a .151 average on the season.
Ricketts and Shults are the first OU freshman to earn All-America honors since Christina Enea (2002) and Erin Evans (2000) were named to the third team.
Updated 06-02-2010
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