The ISU softball team received a break when its doubleheader with the North Dakota State Bison was moved from Fargo, N.D., to Ames. Otherwise, the Cyclones (19-27, 0-4 Big 12) would have had to play four games in three days in two different places.

The Bison (21-16) are led by their all-around star junior Allison Bakke, the team’s second-leading hitter and No. 1 starting pitcher. The Bison and the Cyclones have two common opponents, Iowa and Kansas, and both teams lost to them once – but the Bison did take a game from the Jayhawks as well.

Coach Stacy Gemeinhardt-Cesler said it is nice having the game on Thursday at home because the players do not have to miss as many classes.”It is always nice to play at home,” Gemeinhardt-Cesler said. “It lets us stay in classes a little longer, which is also important for the kids.”

Senior left fielder Katie Reichling said it will be nice not to have to travel after practice.”It’s kind of a big thing,” Reichling said. “We always like playing at our field.”

After the doubleheader Thursday, the Cyclones will travel to Norman, Okla., for a two-game Big 12 Conference weekend series with the Oklahoma Sooners (38-4, 4-2 Big 12), who are rated second and third in the USA Today/NFCA poll and the ESPN/USA softball poll, respectively.

The Sooners have had two players named national player of the week this season and one of them, senior third baseman Norrelle Dickson, has a shot at conference player of the year. Dickson is fifth in the league in batting average, and leads the league in home runs and runs batted in. The other player who was recognized as the best player in the country for a week was sophomore catcher Samantha Ricketts, who is leading the conference with a .504 batting average.

Freshman pitcher Charissa Carlin said the biggest key to the Cyclones upsetting the Sooners is minimizing errors.”We need to be mentally tough through the entire game,” Carlin said. “We need to score some runs and not leave so many runners on base.”

Oklahoma also has the conference leader in victories in junior pitcher Lauren Eckermann. Eckermann has a 22-1 record and a 1.48 ERA going into the Sooners’ game Wednesday against the Oklahoma State Cowboys, who swept Iowa State last weekend.

Gemeinhardt-Cesler said the most important thing for the Cyclones is to go out and have a good performance against the Sooners.”We just have to do the things we can do,” Gemeinhardt-Cesler said. “We can’t get caught up in the things other teams can do.”

Oklahoma has only lost to Tulsa, North Carolina State and No. 10 Texas, but Reichling said her team has a chance to beat anybody. “They’re [Oklahoma] playing really well right now,” Reichling said. “We’ll really have to come out strong and build off of what we did last year.”

The Cyclones are coming off a close 2-1 loss, in which they had a chance to tie in the top of the seventh at Iowa on Tuesday. Senior pitcher Alyssa Ransom (7-10) pitched a complete game in the loss and senior catcher Ashley Killeen drove in the lone ISU run.

Gemeinhardt-Cesler said she was not exactly sure how her team was going to react after being swept by Oklahoma State. “I thought that they played really well and competed great,” Gemeinhardt-Cesler said. “I thought the entire game that we were going to win and that’s what you want every time you go out.”