West Virginia Closes Out the Regular Season at Home vs. Kansas State
Morgantown, WV - The West Virginia Mountaineers (30-20, 11-10 Big 12) will make their final homestand as the Kansas State Wildcats (27-24, 8-13) roll into town for a three-game Big 12 Conference series to wrap up the regular season. The first pitch is set for Thursday at 6:30 pm EST. Game two is scheduled for Friday at 6:30 and the series finale is Saturday at noon. All games will be streaming on ESPN+.
The Wildcats separated themselves from the bottom of the conference standings this month with series wins over Kansas and Baylor and have the opportunity to move up to sixth with three wins over West Virginia. Kansas State is 6-3 in May, including a series salvaging win over Oklahoma to begin the month, and are coming off an 8-2 loss at No.3 Virginia Tech on Tuesday.
Dominic Jonson leads the Wildcats at the plate with a .342 batting average, 69 hits and 17 doubles, to go with 11 home runs while Dylan Phillips has a team-high 13 home runs, and Nick Goodwin has raked in a team-best 45 RBIs. Meanwhile, freshman Kaelen Culpepper leads the team with a .333 batting average in conference play.
Christopher Hall- Sports Illustrated: West Virginia
West Virginia was unable to make its move up the standings in the final month of May, suffering series losses to Texas and at Oklahoma but managed to escape with a win in both series, and most importantly, knocked off rival Pitt in-between to take the regular season series. The Mountaineers are coming off a 17-7 loss to Oklahoma in a decisive game three. Overall, WVU was outscored by the Sooners 40-17 last weekend.
Four Mountaineers (Austin Davis, Braden Barry, McGwire Holbrook, Dayne Leonard) are hitting at least .300 or better during league play, with Austin Davis leading the way hitting .375, good enough for sixth in the Big 12.
McGwire Holbrook is hitting a team-high .333 with Davis not far behind at .332 on the season, and freshman Grant Hussey leads the Mountaineers in home runs with nine.
Junior right-handed pitcher Jacob Watters (2-6, 5.85 ERA) will take the mound for the Mountaineers in game one. Game two will feature sophomore left-hander Ben Hampton (7-4, 4.65 ERA), while K-State counters with right-hander German Fajardo (4-1, 3.11 ERA) in the opener and right-hander Blake Adams (5-5, 4.54 ERA) in the middle game. Saturday’s matchup is to be announced.
West Virginia leads the all-time series over Kansas State 13-11.
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