Having wrapped up non-conference play in successful fashion with a 7-2 win Tuesday night against Marshall in a neutral-site matchup at GoMart Ballpark, 15th-ranked West Virginia can direct all of its attention the remainder of the week to what lies ahead — the toughest series of the season.
Starting with Friday’s 7 p.m. matchup at Hoglund Ballpark, the Mountaineers will play three games at No. 7 Kansas, which would secure no worse than a share of the Big 12 Conference Championship with a series win.
“They’ll be excited about the opportunity in front of them,” WVU coach Steve Sabins said, “and they’re all aware of the situation.”
The Jayhawks (37-12, 20-4) had their win streak snapped at 10 Tuesday with a 9-8 loss at Creighton in 13 innings. It was Kansas’ second setback across its last 23 contests as an 11-game win streak preceded the most recent one. KU is 18-2 at home this season, including 12-0 in Big 12 games.
The Mountaineers (32-12, 16-8) enter winners of four straight and in a two-way tie for second in the league standings with Arizona State. UCF and Oklahoma State are one and two games, back, respectively, while Cincinnati and TCU are three games back of second and tied for fifth.
WVU remains 14th among as many teams in the league with 35 home runs, though eight have come across the last three contests, including multiple home runs in all three games.
“We’re driving the ball and the ball is starting to carry,” Sabins said. “That’s what happens. They usually come in clumps and guys usually hit for a little bit more power late in their careers, later in the season, so hopefully that trend continues.”
Gavin Kelly, the Mountaineers’ top hitter for average and power, has homered in three straight and accounted for half of those eight long balls, including two across his first two at bats against the Thundering Herd to up his season total to 10.
“I feel like the whole season, we’ve been playing good ball, whether it’s been hitting hard balls right at people or things not going our way sometimes,” Kelly said. “At the end of the day, it’s baseball, so it’s more so staying the same every day and trying to be consistent.”
Kansas has had solid power numbers for much of the season and is third in the Big 12 with 83 home runs and first with 279 base-on-balls, though those totals are in five more games than the Mountaineers.
Still, Tyson LeBlanc (16), Augusto Mungarrieta (12) and Josh Dykhoff (11) all have more home runs than any WVU player, and Tyson Owens has 10 to match Kelly, giving Kansas four of the Big 12’s top 26 home run hitters.
Starting pitching has largely been a strength for WVU, which has three of the top 16 leaders in innings pitched in the Big 12 — all three of which are in line to face the Jayhawks.
Sabins will keep his team’s rotation the same as what it was in last week’s three-game sweep of Kansas State: Left-hander Maxx Yehl on Friday followed by right-handers Chansen Cole and Dawson Montesa in Games 2 and 3, respectively.
In his first action in 12 days last Friday against KSU, Yehl logged five scoreless innings to lower his season ERA to a Big 12-best 2.20.
Yehl is 6-1 with 70 strikeouts and 17 walks and has allowed two home runs in 57.1 innings.
Cole has an 8-1 record and leads the conference in wins, while his 2.64 ERA is second to only Yehl.
Following a complete game last Saturday, Cole has logged a team-high 64.2 innings.
Montesa spent much of the season pitching in the series opener Friday, and though he hasn’t matched the success of Yehl or Cole, he comes off one of his better outings, having limited the Wildcats to one run on two hits with six strikeouts in four innings.
Montesa’s 70 strikeouts are tied with Yehl for the team lead.
“They’ve been tremendous for us,” Sabins said. “Yehl and Cole have kind of anchored the pitching staff this year from an innings pitched and success standpoint, and Montesa has been really good for us as well, so we’ll go into the weekend with that crew.”
Right-hander Ian Korn has been plenty reliable and is available for extended action in a relief role after not pitching against the Herd, thanks in large part to starter David Hagen allowing one run over a career-high five innings.
The Mountaineers have a Big 12-best 4.16 ERA as a team — more than a full run better than Kansas, which is fifth at 5.45.
With a RPI of 23 and the Jayhawks at 15 as of Wednesday night, West Virginia would undoubtedly improve that figure and realistically keep hope alive to be one of 16 teams to host a NCAA Regional should it claim the series, though anything short of a sweep likely leaves it more of a long shot than strong possibility.
After the series at Kansas, the Mountaineers will welcome TCU for the final three games of the regular season starting Thursday, May 14.
“The expectation at our program has been elevated the last five or six years, and our players know,” Sabins said. “When you go to back-to-back Super Regionals, and you’ve been in the top 25 for nine consecutive years and do things that have never been done in program history before, people understand what the expectations are. Sometimes later in the season, players start to play looser, more free and they’re having more fun because they kind of get used to those expectations. Usually more of the message is go play like you’re 12 years old in the backyard playing whiffle ball. That’s usually when you’re better.”