The No. 15 baseball team blew out the No. 20 Kansas State Wildcats 14-3 tonight in the first game of its final home series during Big 12 play.

The Sooners (31-11, 9-8 Big 12) pounded Wildcat pitching for 18 hits, and junior pitcher Zach Neal was on point and worked without facing many jams on the mound.

Of the 40 conference games these two teams have played against each other, this is the 23rd time OU scored double-digit runs against Kansas State. The Sooners have done this in each of the last three games against the Wildcats, and this is the first series opener OU has won in the past six series between the teams.

Neal gave up one run in the first inning, but the Wildcats one-run lead was short lived.

OU’s bats came out hot by striking for four runs in the first inning featuring three extra base hits — a triple by sophomore third baseman Garrett Buechele and doubles by freshman left fielder Max White and senior designated hitter Ross Hubbard. The Sooners scored two runs in the second inning on a two-run single by sophomore shortstop Caleb Bushyhead.

Buechele’s triple extended his hitting streak to 14 games. Buechele ended the game with career highs in hits (5) and RBIs (5), and he missed the cycle by a home run.

“I hate to say it, but yeah, I was going to take one swing in that [final] at-bat and give it a whirl, and if I didn’t get it I figured I’d just go back and take my standard approach,” Buechele said. “I knew he was throwing a slider and he threw it, and I just missed it.”

The five-run lead was more than enough cushion for Neal (6-1), who allowed just one Wildcat base runner to reach third base after the second inning.

The Sooners tacked on four runs in the fifth inning by batting around the order for the 17th time this season and fifth time during Big 12 play. Sophomore center fielder Erik Ross drove in a run on a fielder’s choice and Buechele drove in two runs on a single.

OU scored three runs in the sixth inning to extend its lead to 13-1 before head coach Sunny Golloway opted to play many of the backups.

Neal exited the game in the seventh inning with a 13-1 lead. He went 6 innings, gave up one run on nine hits and struck out two batters.

Even though Neal threw just 82 pitches, he was taken out of the game because he had thrown over 110 pitches in each of his past few starts, Golloway said.

“Tonight was an opportunity to get 82 pitches to get him out of there, and that’s exactly what I wanted to do,” he said.

Neal doesn’t have a problem with going 120 pitches during a start, but it is nice to not have to throw that many pitches every week, he said.

Kansas State scored two runs in its final three innings at the plate, but the game was out of hand for the runs to be much of a factor.

Buechele drove in OU’s final run of the game with a single in the eighth.

The Sooners and Wildcats are slated to start game two of the series at 5 p.m. Saturday at L. Dale Mitchell Park. Junior pitcher Bobby Shore is scheduled to start, and he has a 6-2 record and a starting pitcher-low 3.25 ERA.

Even though OU won convincingly tonight, the team knows a good first game of a series does not always translate to a series victory. The last time the Sooners won the opener by double-digits was against Texas Tech, and they wound up losing the final two games and losing the series.

“I still think we’re going to be in a dogfight the rest of the weekend,” Golloway said.