WVU’s Path to Omaha Begins as Morgantown Regional Field is Revealed

Postseason baseball is returning to Morgantown. This weekend, the West Virginia Mountaineers will host a regional in the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2019.

Moments ago, the NCAA selection committee announced this year's field and will have Wake Forest, Kentucky, and Binghamton as the No. 2, 3, and 4 seeds, respectively, in the Morgantown regional. They will be the No. 16 overall seed, meaning they will likely face UCLA in a super regional, assuming they and the Bruins both get out of the regional round.

This means West Virginia will take on Binghamton Friday night, and if they win, they will face the winner of Kentucky/Wake Forest on Saturday.

Kendrick Family Ballpark will be an absolute scene, just as it was seven years ago. Only this time around, the expectations are at a whole other level. You could make the argument that this is truly the first time in program history that the Mountaineers have a legit shot to make it to Omaha. This year's group is more balanced and talented than the teams they've had the past two years that advanced to supers but failed to reach the College World Series.

“We get an opportunity to host a regional, and we got 5,000 fans in a sold-out stadium with crazy West Virginians, that’s going to be the best and most fun electric atmosphere in the country," WVU head coach Steve Sabins said. "It’s all ahead of you. So you hope that maybe that game (against Kansas) allows us to have the best week of practice from a concentration and focus standpoint. You want guys to be like, ‘Well, that didn’t taste very good. I don’t like that. I don’t want that to happen again.’ You hope that it motivates people to be better in those areas and to have better at-bats and take care of their body and do all the things necessary to go win a regional. We’ve done that two years in a row, so the guys know what it takes to go do that.”

Winning the Big 12 tournament would have been great for the program, but as Sabins was alluding to, maybe losing the championship game to Kansas is a blessing in disguise. WVU had won 11 of 12 going into that game, and to stay that hot entering the NCAA Tournament could actually be bad for some teams because it can get to your head. Every now and then, you need that humbling moment that will fuel your team with some extra motivation, and the hope is that the loss to Kansas does exactly that.

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