GRANVILLE — West Virginia found itself on the short end of one of the weirdest statistical outcomes a baseball team could have Sunday.
Jared Cushing hit two home runs — one of them a grand slam in the second inning — to lead Xavier to an 8-3 victory to avoid a sweep by the No. 24 Mountaineers.
The final box score tells a mystifying tale, though, as the Musketeers (11-12) needed just five hits to score the eight runs, walking out of Mon County Ballpark hitting just .161 as a team.
Meanwhile, WVU hitters drew 10 walks, were hit two more times and had seven hits, but the Mountaineers (18-6) ended up like a broke man in Las Vegas, they never cashed in.
“We just left 13 guys on base,” WVU manager Randy Mazey said. “It felt like at any moment that somebody was going to get a big hit to open things up, but Xavier played great. They made all the plays today defensively.”
WVU’s best chance to get back in the game came in the second inning, but for the first time all season, J.J. Wetherholt proved to be human.
He struck out with the bases loaded and teammate Braden Berry followed that with another strikeout, as Xavier squashed the rally.
Wetherholt, who has spent the first five weeks of the season as one of the most impressive hitters in the country, went 0 for 4, but did steal two bases.
It was just the second time in 24 games the sophomore from Mars. Pa. was held without a hit.
“The laws of average, you know, J.J. was hitting over .470, but that still means he’s making more outs than he gets hits,” Mazey said. “If you hit .500, it’s a coin flip, and no one hits .500. He’s the right guy in the right spot. I’d take that 100 times in a row if you offered it to me.”
No one else provided much help. WVU finished just 3 for 19 (.158) with runners on base.
Dayne Leonard had two of those hits and three on the day. He drove in two runs and Ellis Garcia added an RBI single in the third, but that was all the Mountaineers could muster.
WVU’s pitching also struggled with a weird day.
Starter Grant Siegel struck out four of the 10 batters he faced, but also walked two and hit two more, which led to Cushing’s grand slam that landed on the roof of the ticket office beyond left field.
Mazey used six relief pitchers to get through the next seven innings. They allowed just three hits, but four walks and two of the hits were home runs.
Xavier took advantage there with a two-run home run by Andrew Walker in the fourth and another homer from Cushing in the eighth for the final score.
“Letting guys on before the homers is what beats you,” Mazey said. “There’s so little room for error in college baseball. You make a mistake and try and throw a fastball away and it ends up in the middle of the plate and a guy hits a homer. That’s a difference of eight-and-a-half inches. You miss by just that much and you give up four runs.”
WVU will host Marshall at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, before traveling to Kansas State on Friday to begin Big 12 play with a three-game series in Manhattan, Kan.
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