MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Head coach Steve Sabins is well aware of the journey that the West Virginia University baseball program has taken to host an NCAA Super Regional series for the first time ever.
Sabins came to Morgantown before the 2016 baseball season, when the Mountaineers were in their second season playing games at then-Monongalia County Ballpark. Since then, WVU has hosted two baseball regionals (in 2019 and 2026), seen future Major League Baseball players play in the program, and advanced to Super Regionals in three consecutive seasons — the last two under Sabins’ direction as head coach.
The 2026 Mountaineers (43-15 overall) clawed their way back from the loser’s bracket of the Morgantown Regional, winning two games on Sunday (10-5 over Wake Forest and 11-9 over Kentucky) and the winner-take-all matchup Monday night (6-5 over Kentucky). WVU will host Cal Poly (39-22) next weekend in a Super Regional best-of-three series.
Sabins was a guest Tuesday on the popular “3 Guys Before the Game” podcast with Tony Caridi, Brad Howe, and Hoppy Kercheval. He said the emotions of the weekend are still quite fresh.
“Really, really special,” Sabins said. “I don’t think you can draw it up any better. Playing five games in four days, and extra innings, come-from-behind victories, hosting a regional for the first time since 2019, and then being able to bring a Super Regional here. It’s special. There’s only two programs in the nation that have won three straight regionals, us and North Carolina.”
Sabins said he remembers the early days of his Mountaineer coaching career. He mentioned there was a time when several assistants had left the program, and so there was only then-head coach Randy Mazey and Sabins on staff.
“Now, we have a staff of 20, we have 35 student managers, we have first-rounders, and biomechanics and performance centers, meal rooms, offices, and we’ve built every single year,” Sabins said. “That doesn’t happen without the support of the athletic department and athletic directors, and the university buying into a vision, seeing something, and saying, ‘why can’t we go be the best at baseball here?'”
The Baseball Biomechanics and Performance Center opened in March 2025 and immediately became a selling point for the WVU program. The performance center is part of the baseball complex, and most of its funding came from WVU alum and Arizona Diamondbacks owner Ken Kendrick.
Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher Paul Skenes, 2024 NL Rookie of the Year and 2025 Cy Young Award winner, visited the facility last August.
Sabins said he’s excited for the entire state, club, and staff to be part of the program’s success. He said a great deal of people have invested time and energy into the program to help it ascend to where it is today.
“You don’t always get rewarded for it, there’s got to be a lot of things going your way as well,” Sabins said. “The work is not something that lacks, in our program and with our staff and with our players, that’s for sure. There’s not people that get after it (more than us) every day, that are appreciative to be somewhere and get better.”
Sabins cited a “total commitment” from everybody associated with the program: players, coaches, fans, and supporters. He said that when he got to Morgantown, the program didn’t have a weight room, a laundry area, or covered batting cages. Sabins said up until 2025, WVU baseball was the only program in the Big 12 Conference not to have covered cages.
“There are a thousand reasons to stack up of why you can’t be good, and there’s another million why you can be good,” Sabins said. “Ours start with the people and the support.”
The program’s success hasn’t been by accident, Sabins said. He noted many people have helped with NIL and funding the program, as those two components have become key in running a college baseball program in the current landscape.
Sabins said that two years ago, there weren’t more than four people giving $50,000 or more to the program. He said there have been over 60 such donations in the last two years.
Capturing the Morgantown Regional was truly a team effort, Sabins said. He admitted it would be very difficult to single out any particular hero of the weekend, because so many players had outstanding games to help the Mountaineers stay alive.
“I think the beauty of what just happened was, we got punched in the face so many times in a weekend, if it was a boxing match, we’d all be concussed with black eyes and still kind of swinging out there,” Sabins said. “There were so many heroic individual performances that it’s hard to wrap your head around it, so then you just go like, ‘team was incredible.'”
“Every one of those kids is the reason we’re still playing,” Sabins continued.
Sabins said everyone in the program has a “deep-rooted belief” to be great. He said without that, the Mountaineers would not have rallied like they did. That belief has been a staple of the program ever since day one.
“That’s the goal since we’ve been here,” Sabins said.
The Mountaineers begin the three-game Super Regional series with Cal Poly on Friday afternoon. First pitch is set for 12 p.m. at Kendrick Family Ballpark. The winner of the series advances to the College World Series in Omaha, Nebraska.