OKLAHOMA CITY, Oklahoma (KVIA) — The El Paso Chihuahuas fall in game five against Oklahoma City, 1-0.

Andy Pages hit a line drive solo home run to left field with two outs in the bottom of the eighth inning in the Oklahoma City Baseball Club’s 1-0 win over the El Paso Chihuahuas Saturday night at Chickasaw Bricktown Ballpark. Oklahoma City has won four of the first five games of the series.

Chihuahuas starter Nabil Crismatt struck out eight batters in 5.2 shutout innings. It was the second time in the last three games that El Paso’s starter has pitched more than five innings and allowed one run or less. Tom Cosgrove pitched a scoreless relief outing for El Paso and he’s allowed only one earned run in 18 innings since June 1.

Oklahoma City starter Alec Gamboa pitched five hitless innings and hasn’t allowed any runs in 10.2 home innings against the Chihuahuas this season. Brandon Lockridge’s single in the sixth inning was El Paso’s only hit. The one hit tied the Chihuahuas’ team record for fewest hits in a game. It was the sixth time this season the Chihuahuas were shut out.

Box Score: Gameday: Chihuahuas 0, Baseball Club 1 Final Score (08/24/2024) (milb.com)

Second Half Team Records: El Paso (16-34), Oklahoma City (25-25)

Next Game: Sunday at 5:05 p.m. Mountain Time at Chickasaw Bricktown Ballpark. El Paso RHP Jared Kollar (2-2, 5.87) vs. Oklahoma City LHP Justin Wrobleski (0-2, 5.23). The game will air on 600 ESPN El Paso and www.epchihuahuas.com.

Oklahoma State is one of the top contenders in the Big 12 next season, but it does not have the trust of some national media.

On Saturday, the first games of the 2024 season are set to kick off, beginning with Florida State and Georgia Tech in Ireland. That also means the first College GameDay of the season. 

The Gameday crew picked its playoff teams and conference champions for 2024. After no one picked the Cowboys to make the College Football Playoff, the GameDay crew doubled down, with no one picking them to win the Big 12.

Pat McAfee and guest picker Sheamus picked an underdog in West Virginia to win the conference. Meanwhile, Desmond Howard, Nick Saban and Kirk Herbstreit picked Utah, the favorite to win the conference.

The Cowboys enter the season at third in conference title odds and also finished third in the Big 12’s preseason poll. As Mike Gundy begins his 20th season as head coach, he is looking to win his second conference title and make the College Football Playoff for the first time.

OSU will face Gameday’s picks to win the conference and Kansas State, which finished second in the preseason poll, over the first three weeks of conference play.

While getting past a three-week stretch of Utah, Kansas State and West Virginia will be a tough task, a 6-0 record could nearly guarantee a spot in the playoff. As OSU’s schedule eases over the final half of the season, its season will be judged heavily by its early three-week stretch.

Of course, a trip to Arlington is the expectation for the Cowboys after making the Big 12 Championship in two of the past three years. While OSU could not get past Baylor and Texas in past opportunities, this could be a chance for the team to stake its claim as the premier team of the new-look Big 12.

READ MORE: ESPN’s College GameDay Leaves OSU Football Out Of College Football Playoff Prediction

Want to join the discussion? Like AllPokes on Facebook and follow us on Twitter to stay up to date on all the latest Cowboys news. You can also meet the team behind the coverage.

The table in front of Drekka at one of his performances can be covered in so many little electronic machines, cables, tape players, and seemingly random physical items that it’s difficult to even make everything out.

But the sounds that he cobbles together out of all that clutter can be even more mysterious and difficult to name, using heavily manipulated electronics, loops, cassette recordings, and ambient vocals to build a series of always shifting, nebulous sonic environments.

With more than two decades’ worth of releases – more than even the Indiana-based artist himself can count or recall – a Drekka performance can pull from hundreds of previously explored dark musical worlds, or incorporate unmapped territory for the first time on the fly.

It’s an experience that Oklahoman audiences will have a chance to catch next week when Drekka brings a three-night run through the state, August 28th at Bookish in OKC, August 29th at Opolis in Norman, both presented by Dissociation OK, and August 30th at Noise Town in Tulsa for the One Aux Experimental Music Showcase.

It’s all part of a larger multi-state trek that sees Drekka bringing his constantly shifting, darkly compelling atmospheres along on his second cross-country tour of the year.

“For a lot of people, that’s just too much,” he said. “But I’m the kind of person that if I’m going to be on the road for ten days, I’d rather just be on the road for forty days.” 

Playing that many shows back to back in closely tied markets can be a minefield for a lot of artists trying to thread a needle between staying true to their set and keeping things fresh enough for repeat viewers and overlapping audiences.

But Drekka (whose real name is Michael “Mkl” Anderson) never sees that as an issue, allowing his sets to take on a mostly fresh and unique life every night.

“I’ve done upwards of a thousand Drekka shows, so I know my gear as well as, say, a guitarist knows their guitar,” Anderson told me by phone ahead of the new tour. “So I’ve definitely got little compositions and structures, but I generally just see what works for the night. And then ten minutes into playing, it’s just like whatever happens, happens.”

Every Drekka performance tends to be different – from minor tweaks between nights to major overhauls – all based on the venue, the crowd, and the energy coming off of the evening.

“I just try to listen,” Anderson said. “It becomes almost kind of a call and response thing.”

When he comes through Oklahoma, it’ll be particularly interesting for him to look and listen and soak up the state’s current scene.

Anderson lived in Norman for a time back in the late 90s and became a part of the deeply underground goth and experimental scene in the Metro at the time.

“There wasn’t a whole lot of ‘indie’ stuff,” he said. “Obviously, The Flaming Lips were super important, and their friends. I actually used to work with [now KOSU radio host] John Mooneyham at Kinko’s with a bunch of other weirdos, and we’d hang out at a little goth record store called Shadowplay and a club called Liberty Drug on Campus Corner.”

Outside of those few venues for underground, niche, and alternative music and culture, however, Anderson said there wasn’t anything close to the open-armed acceptance of left-field styles and counter cultures that seems to drive the OKC and Norman scenes now.

“It’s the kind of thing I think you see in any college town that’s able to evolve over time,” he said. “It’s the same as in Bloomington [Indiana] where I live now. The college town culture just needs something kind of bigger than itself to grow.”

The key, he believes, to developing that kind of encompassing, less-exclusive community that’s willing to take chances on strange music and esoteric performances, even if it’s small, is to create a scene that recognizes the importance of supporting one another instead of looking for outside validation.

“I think with a place like Oklahoma City,” he said, “It’s a big city, but it’s also small enough – and in Oklahoma – that there just kind of has to be some kind of self-sufficient underground culture. It has to thrive on its own.”

Between the hyper-indie Dissociation and One Aux groups, and the mind-warping creativity of the acts and artists he’ll be performing alongside, it’s safe to say that he’ll have a front-row view of just how much Oklahoma’s underground culture is thriving.

Drekka does a three-night run through Oklahoma August 28th at Bookish in OKC, August 29th at Opolis in Norman, both presented by Dissociation OK and August 30th at Noise Town in Tulsa for the One Aux Experimental Music Showcase.

For more information, visit opolis.org, noisetowntulsa.com, and follow @shop.bookish, @dissociationoklahoma, and @one.aux all on Instagram.

Follow Drekka at @mkldrekka on Instagram and at drekka.bandcamp.com.

You can find out about local music and performance happenings in the OKC metro weekly in this music column by Brett Fieldcamp. | Brought to you by True Sky Credit Union.

Brett Fieldcamp has been covering arts, entertainment, news, housing, and culture in Oklahoma for nearly 15 years, writing for several local and state publications. He’s also a musician and songwriter and holds a certification as Specialist of Spirits from The Society of Wine Educators.