Patty Gasso shares what she'll remember from this year's Oklahoma team

How do you win three national championships in a row? Sports fans might think it’s consistency, having the same dominant edge from year to year. But for Oklahoma softball, the path to a three-peat required a complete shift in philosophy from head coach Patty Gasso. After leading the Sooner program to a third straight title and a record-breaking winning streak, she offered just one reason behind it all: her willingness to change.

Gasso explained after the second win over Florida State that she and her team simply weren’t on the same page to start the year. Rather than dig her heels in and blame the players for not responding to her coaching, she pivoted to find a style of coaching they did respond to, which meant relaxing the barriers between coach and player a little bit.

Allow her to explain:

“The first time we got together, we kind of clashed pretty immediately. They didn’t like something that I was doing. I didn’t like their response,” Gasso recalled. “We kind of had a powwow led by Brett Ledbetter, who is a phenomenal guy who understands the dynamic of sport. He was kind of navigating us through it. I remember walking away and feeling really upset and really hurt. But I had to understand that they wanted to be heard and they wanted me to know them.”

Gasso admits she was hurt by that meeting, that her ego took a bruise and she had to completely alter her approach. Here’s how she did just that:

“If I look like my clothes are fitting a little bit tight is because I took each one of them out to breakfast or lunch or dinner, each one of ’em, and sat with them and talked to them — actually I didn’t talk. I wanted them to talk. I needed to listen,” Gasso continued. “They wanted me to know them. I surrendered my ego to make sure I did that. I think that was a step maybe in the right direction. Then things just started to flow.

“With this group I stepped back. I go to Grace Lyons and I say, ‘What do you want to do here? Do you want to do this? Do you want to do that?’ Where normally as a coach, ‘This is what we’re doing, then we’re doing this, going there, then we’re doing this.’

“They are begging, without saying it out loud, for time. They need time. They need rest. They need time so that softball is not defining them. But I think you have very loudly heard, as you have been listening to them, they are defined not by softball. That is what is freeing for them.”

Gasso then took the last page out of the Slumdog Millionaire script and said her team knew the final result of the season was “written.” Much like Jamal Malik on that Indian gameshow, Oklahoma performed calm and confident, no matter the circumstances.

“If you’re wondering…Wow, they don’t look nervous. It’s because they’re not. They know it’s written. They know they’ve just got to play their best. If they win, outstanding, wonderful. If not, it wasn’t meant to be. But they never play tight. They never play afraid. If someone is ahead, they’re not afraid because I think they’ve really found their freedom away from the nerves. That’s through their faith,” Gasso said.

“I can’t tell you how proud I am that they are standing up and being vocal about where their hearts are, whether it’s faith, whether it’s stance for something, whatever it is. They’re finding that they have this freedom and they’re trying to share it. I love it. I’m proud of them for doing that.”

Well, that was a pretty spiritual Patty Gasso after the game. What’s so fascinating is how open and willing she was in changing her coaching philosophy. You can hear it in her comments. This player-driven and more hands-off approach isn’t natural to Coach Gasso but it’s the way she had to coach in order to get the program over the line for three straight.

That, folks, is coaching. Patty Gasso led Oklahoma to two straight national championships and still stopped to ask herself: am I doing this right? Even after back-to-back titles, she decided no, she wasn’t, and changed how she related to her players to bring the best out of this particular team. And she’ll morph again into a completely different coach next season if that’s what it takes to get the best out of that team.

Oklahoma has a dynasty and it all starts with Patty Gasso.