Oklahoma 3, Texas Tech 1

Wednesday, May 26th 2004, 4:42 pm

By: News On 6

ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) _ Mark Roberts set a Big 12 tournament record with 12 strikeouts and allowed just four hits over eight innings, and Oklahoma beat Texas Tech 3-1 Thursday in an elimination game.

Roberts (9-4), Oklahoma's career strikeout leader, pushed his career total to 326. The 12 strikeouts were a career high for Roberts, who had at least eight strikeouts for the 11th time this season.

Oklahoma (37-21) led for good after Jeff Scuderi led off the bottom of the first with a double off Dallas Braden (5-4) and scored on a double-play grounder.

Matt Bose had a leadoff single in the fourth and scored on Eric Thornton's double for a 2-0 lead. Andrew McGuire led off the fifth with a single and scored on a throwing error.

The Red Raiders (38-19) played without starting shortstop Cameron Blair and three reserves suspended by coach Larry Hays for unspecified violations of team rules.

Tech's only run came when Josh Brady led off the seventh with his Big 12-leading 19th home run.

Jose Delgado switched from second base to shortstop, and moved up to the leadoff spot usually occupied by Blair, the team's leading hitter at .378. Delgado went 2-for-3 with a walk.

Braden allowed three runs on six hits with five strikeouts over seven innings.

Jarod McAuliff worked the ninth for his sixth save for Oklahoma, which has never been eliminated from the Big 12 tournament in two games.