GRANVILLE — If West Virginia didn’t enter a state of panic Saturday, then the No. 24 Mountaineers are at least a potential candidate for a nervous breakdown.
That was the situation at Mon County Ballpark after Kansas walked away with a 10-7 victory, securing the season series and putting the Jayhawks in a position to go for the sweep on Sunday.
“Nobody panics, that’s our No. 1 rule,” WVU manager Randy Mazey said.
There might be cause for it after the Jayhawks (15-14, 5-3 Big 12) — picked eighth in the conference in the preseason — roughed up WVU pitching for three home runs for a second consecutive day.
Those three home runs — a three-run shot by Cole Elvis in the fifth inning, in particular — helped Kansas erase a 3-0 deficit.
While the Jayhawks have won seven in a row, this is the first time Kansas has won a Big 12 road series since March 2018. The Jayhawks had dropped their last 15 conference road series before this trip to Morgantown.
K.U. has hit six home runs in the two wins, while Mazey has gone deep into his bullpen, using 10 pitchers in the two setbacks.
Last weekend, Kansas State hit nine home runs in a three-game series and Marshall hit three more in a 15-9 loss on Wednesday in Charleston.
“How do you address that?” Mazey said about the home runs allowed. “It’s hard to address. You’ve just got to attack them with your best stuff. If you make mistakes, good hitters are going to do that. Hopefully the pitchers will learn from that.”
Meanwhile, the Mountaineers’ momentum seems all but gone after entering the national rankings for the first time since 2019.
WVU (22-9, 2-3) stranded 11 runners on base for a second time against the Jayhawks, hitting just 1 for 13 (.077) with runners in scoring position.
“We were super passive when guys get in scoring position,” Mazey said. “It seems like we take the first strike every time and we’re not ready to hit. We can address that.”
J.J. Wetherholt led off the game with a single, but that was his only hit of the game, and Braden Barry followed him with three strikeouts.
WVU’s top two hitters in the order are a combined 2 for 17 in the series.
The concerning part of it all is all of this is coming against one of the lesser pitching staffs in the Big 12, at least statistically. Kansas entered the series with the second-highest ERA in the league.
“The toughest part of our schedule we haven’t even got to, yet,” Mazey said. “We’ve played great up to this point. It’s hard to go through an entire season without hitting a spell like this and losing a couple of games you felt like you shouldn’t have lost. It happens to everyone. It’s just the tougher teams will make their way out of it.”
After falling behind 3-0, Kansas finally got to WVU starter Blaine Traxel in the fifth. Elvis’ three-run home run did the damage, but Traxel also hit two batters that inning and Jackson Cobb added a run-scoring triple.
Traxel (5-3) took the loss after allowing seven hits and six runs over five innings. He struck out four.
For good measure, Kansas added three more runs in the eighth via a solo home run from Jake English, Cobb scored on an RBI groundout and Michael Brooks scored on a fielding error.
For WVU, freshman Logan Sauve hit his first collegiate home run, a two-run shot to right field in the second inning and Landon Wallace and Tevin Tucker each had two hits.
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