OKLAHOMA CITY (April 10, 2020) – Softball and microbiology, the two great loves of Bailey Strecker's life, collided in an unfortunate way for student-athletes around the nation during the past few weeks, as the pandemic caused by the COVID-19 virus resulted in seasons suddenly being cancelled.

Strecker's chosen course of study – and, she hopes, her professional life after college – will involve research into finding ways to defeat bacteria and viruses that can wreak havoc on human life. It's quite possible the Oklahoma Christian senior utility player will be even more motivated because one of those viruses ended her playing career about three months sooner than she had hoped.

"I knew that (softball) was going to end for me; I just wish it had ended on my terms," Strecker said. "But I do have other plans. I've kind of had a path that I wanted to take. I knew softball was not always going to be a part of that path. Having it taken away the way it was really sucks, but I knew it was going to end regardless.

"What I ultimately want to do (is) continue my research and basically play around with bacteria for the rest of my life."

Strecker, from Oklahoma City, had worked with former OC assistant coach Steve Gault as a youth softball player and played under OC alumnus Colin White at Carl Albert High School in Midwest City, but attending and playing for OC wasn't initially in her plans. She signed with Saint Louis, which competes in NCAA Division I, because she "wanted to experience the world outside of Oklahoma."

But her softball experience there wasn't pleasant, as she played in only eight games as a freshman. Looking for a school to which she could transfer, she reconnected with Gault and then-OC head coach Tom Heath and enrolled at OC for the 2017-18 academic year.

It's been a good fit all around. On the field, she started as both a sophomore and junior – sometimes at third base, sometimes at second base, sometimes at catcher – helping the Eagles to the 2018 Heartland Conference tournament title game (hitting .304 with 17 RBIs for the season) and the league regular-season and tournament titles in 2019 (when she hit .245 with 30 RBIs).

The latter year, she played a key role as OC – the lowest seed in its NCAA regional tournament – knocked off No. 11 Colorado Mesa and No. 10 West Texas A&M to advance to the regional title game. This season, she started 12 games and was hitting .286 with eight RBIs for the Eagles, who were 21-5 and ranked No. 16 in NCAA Division II when their potentially special season suddenly was halted.

"She is the epitome of an all-around good player," OC coach Shanon Hays said. "Her speed suffered with her knee injury (her sophomore season) and she fought every day the battle of maintaining health with that knee. She always knew where to play in relation with what pitchers were throwing and type of hitters they were facing. She's just a very cerebral player.

"One of the great things that Bailey did for us this year is she led by example for the younger girls we had coming in. Infielders would watch how she did things the right way. She was a coach on the field. She was willing to do whatever she could to help the team in whatever role you used her in. She was a super leader."

Strecker, a Biology major who will graduate in April, applied the same intensity to her classwork. She has served as a teaching assistant the past couple of years for Jonathan Hunt, an assistant professor of biology at OC, with her duties including prepping for Hunt's microbiology class. That prep work "always was ready to go," Hunt said, no matter what Strecker's softball schedule looked like. "She has a great attitude."

Last summer, she worked with Hunt on a research project at the Dean McGee Eye Institute in Oklahoma City, focusing on treatment of bacterial keratitis, a common injury to the cornea. Antibiotic eye drops often are used to treat such infections, but with the increasing antibiotic resistance by the bacteria Pseudomonas aeruginosa, researchers are searching for more effective options.

The research by Strecker and Hunt focused on a bioengineered, enzymatic protein, Lysocin, which has shown promise in treating keratitis. Strecker presented the research last August at the Oklahoma Women in STEM and Entrepreneurship (OK-WISE) conference in Tulsa and won an award for best undergraduate poster presentation. It was the first time an OC student had received the OK-WISE honor.

"The lab work does not happen on an eight-hour, five-day schedule," Hunt said. "She put some hard work in the last week. This is the way that science happens. You spend all this time figuring out how to do something and then it comes together in a short period of time. She put in a lot of work in the last 10 days to make the poster and present the data."

As the pandemic took hold and the 2020 season was wiped out, the NCAA granted all Division II spring-sports athletes, including seniors, an extra season of eligibility. Strecker thought about coming back for one more go-round, but doing so wouldn't work well with her academic plans, so she made the difficult decision to end her playing career. But she said she'll always use the lessons she's learned from the sport.

"The things that I've learned from playing … a team sport are invaluable," she said. "I've had to figure out how to manage my time and had to figure out my communication skills. I've been able to hone in on those characteristics and … really excel in those parts of life."

Strecker has applied to graduate school at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center and should learn soon if she's been accepted. If she is, she soon will begin a five-to-six-year program during which she will earn her doctoral degree in microbiology and immunology. It would include two years of full-time coursework followed by more years of full-time research and publishing papers.

The ultimate goal, naturally, will be to find solutions to fighting the microbes that cause so much misery in the world. She said her OC education has prepared her well toward that end.

"For the degree that I'm getting in biology, the science department at OC is well above anywhere else," she said. "It may be tough, and grades obviously reflect that, but anyone who goes through it is definitely prepared for what they want to do next."

Bailey Strecker highlight video: https://youtu.be/d8Z5g2wDC-g