West Virginia baseball met in-state foe Marshall on Wednesday, for the first of two meetings over the next week. The Mountaineers got the best of their southern counterpart, outlasting them, 9-7 at Monongalia County Ballpark.
It wasn’t the best of starts for the Mountaineers as Aidan Major struggled to find his command early on. Major hit the first batter of the game, who later scored on a sac-bunt, putting the Thundering Herd in front, 1-0.
In the bottom of the first it would not take long for WVU to respond. JJ Wetherholt led off the game with a double, scoring on a Dayne Leonard single to tie the game. Landon Wallace then cleared the bases, hitting a three-run triple, to put the Mountaineers in front, 4-1.
The struggles for Major would continue in the second inning. The sophomore walked the leadoff batter, before he advanced to second on a wild pitch. Major then hit another batter, before surrendering a two-run triple, as Marshall trailed 4-3. Major’s day finished as he pitched 1.2 innings, giving up three runs on one hit.
Leading 4-3, the Mountaineers got an insurance run in the fourth on a Caleb McNeely double, but Marshall came right back with a run in the top of the fifth. Leading 5-4, the Mountaineers added two more runs in the sixth, capped off by a Sam White home run.
Marshall wouldn’t go away, scoring once more in the seventh, and twice more in the eighth, cutting West Virginia’s lead to 8-7. The Mountaineers got one back in the bottom of the eighth, before Carlson Reed shut the door in the ninth inning.
The Mountaineers improved to 19-6 on the year, with West Virginia’s next game being on the road in their first Big 12 series of the year against Kansas State.
