After coming off a lackluster finish in last year’s Women’s College World Series, the Oklahoma softball team renews its hunt for the national title against Cal State-Bakersfield at 1:15 p.m. Friday at the Sportco Classic in Las Vegas.

The Sooners are ranked No. 5 in the USA Today preseason poll and were picked to finish second in the Big 12 by conference coaches.

Oklahoma returns 12 letter winners from last year’s team that finished with a 43-19 record and earned the program’s sixth WCWS appearance. Although the Sooners couldn’t produce the runs they needed to beat their WCWS opponents, last year’s experience as one of the final eight teams is something coach Patty Gasso hopes will ignite this year’s squad.

“What I feel is that the experience at the WCWS has really elevated the game — the maturity — but also the passion for wanting things a little bit more,” Gasso said. “I really enjoy working with this team every day. It’s a very easy job right now because they’re all on the same page and have the same goals and missions.”

Returning junior All-American battery mates, Keilani Ricketts and Jessica Shults, plan to pick up where they left off last season as OU’s dominating threats on the mound and behind the plate.

Ricketts and Shults also were named to the preseason USA Softball Collegiate Player of Year Watch list last week, the second consecutive year the pitcher-catcher combo has been nominated to the prestigious group.

As one of the vocal leaders on the team who leads by voice and action, Shults said this team is hungry to get back to the WCWS this season.

“We know how good we are, and we want to get back,” Shults said. “Hopefully (we’ll) have an opportunity to win the national championship because we have the talent this year and our chemistry is awesome. Just the taste isn’t enough; we want to get more.”

The team also introduces six freshmen to the roster this season, including Australian standout pitcher Georgia Casey and 2010 High School UnderArmour All-American Lauren Chamberlain. While Gasso was quick to admit all of the team’s newcomers have their own skill set to bring to the team, she said she has been impressed by how soon she could start rotating the freshmen into the lineup.

“The freshmen have come and really stepped in quickly,” Gasso said, who is entering her 18th season at OU. “They’ll make a big impact for us. They don’t play like freshmen, and that’s the beauty of them right now.”

That kind of impact will be needed after the team lost three starters to graduation last season — former team captain Chana’e Jones (.500 slugging percentage), former infielder Dani Dobbs (.561 slugging percentage) and former outfielder Haley Nix (.419 slugging percentage).

And OU will need underclassmen talent to step up in clutch situations because the Sooners have one of the nation’s toughest schedules, including contests against 11 preseason top 25 teams.

Apart from competing in a highly touted season opener against No. 22 LSU on March 2, OU winds down the month with contests against No. 15 Michigan and No.12 Washington in the Judi Garman Classic in California. The Sooners also will face Baylor, Texas A&M and Iowa State on the road but will get Kansas, Texas Tech, Missouri and Texas at home. The Bedlam rivalry kicks off this season March 28 at Hall of Fame Stadium in Oklahoma City before a regular-season home-and-away series.

OU also will face UNLV at 5:45 p.m. in the second game of Friday’s doubleheader before facing Weber State and Kent State later this weekend