After losing the first game of the series to Kansas on Friday night, the Mountaineers were looking to even the series on Saturday afternoon but the Kansas offense proved to be too much for West Virginia as they fell 10-7.
West Virginia jumped out to an early three run lead, but Kansas would score six runs across the fourth and fifth innings to take a lead they would ultimately not relinquish.
The story for WVU was their inability to get hits with runners on base, leaving 11 men on base throughout the game.
Blaine Traxel started for the Mountaineers, going five innings and allowing six runs after a scoreless first three innings.
West Virginia struck early, getting a run in the first inning after JJ Wetherholt singled and Dayne Leonard doubled to give WVU runners on the corners with one out. Caleb McNeely hit a sacrifice fly to center field to score Wetherholt but that was all West Virginia got in the inning.
Landon Wallace doubled to lead off the second inning for WVU, leading to a Logan Sauve two run home run, the first of the freshman’s career and the Mountaineers had a 3-0 early lead.
Kansas got a run back in the top of the fourth inning on a Janson Reeder solo home run to cut the WVU lead to two.
The top of the fifth inning is when the Jayhawks offense got to Traxel, scoring five runs on only three hits. The inning started with Traxel hitting the lead-off batter, which was followed by a Jackson Cobb RBI triple. Traxel hit his second batter of the inning to give Kansas runners on the corners with no one out. Jackson Kline hit into a fielder’s choice where WVU was unable to turn the double-play and the tying run scored. Two hitters later Cole Elvis hit his second home run in as many days to score all three more runs and give Kansas a 6-3 lead.
West Virginia loaded the bases with no one out in the bottom of the sixth, looking for a big inning to regain their lead. Sauve got hit by a pitch to bring in one run and keep the bases loaded. Tevin Tucker hit a sacrifice fly to right field to score another run and give WVU second and third with one out, down 6-5. Wetherholt flew out to left field, but it was not deep enough to score Sam White from third base. Braden Barry walked to reload the bases, but Leonard grounded out to end the inning.
Kansas added an insurance run in the top of the seventh after a two out walk of Elvis led to a Reeder double down the line to score Elvis.
In the bottom of the inning West Virginia got runners on second and third with one out, but were only able to score one run on a Sam White RBI groundout to cut the deficit to 7-6.
Kansas added three more runs in the top of the eighth, on a Jake English lead-off home run, an RBI groundout by Kline and a Mountaineer fielding error.
A Tevin Tucker triple to start the bottom of the eighth followed by a Wetherholt walk had WVU with runners on the corners with no outs. They would only get one run out of it though on a Leonard RBI groundout.
WVU got the tying run to the plate in the bottom of the ninth down to their last out, but Tucker struck out to end the game and lose the series.
Logan Sauve led the Mountaineers with three RBI’s, all of his first career home run. Landon Wallace and Tevin Tucker each added two hits, with Tucker also driving in a run.
West Virginia will look to avoid the sweep on Sunday afternoon, with first pitch set for 3 p.m. at Wagener Field.
