Photo by: WV Illustrated
Mountaineers Bag Win No. 20
April 25, 2018 12:29 PM | Baseball
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - It took five hours for West Virginia to get its 20th victory of the season Tuesday night against Marshall at rain-soaked Appalachian Power Park in Charleston.
The game was as sloppy as the field on which the two teams were playing, the wet conditions clearly impacting play.
The Mountaineers and Thundering Herd combined to walk 20 batters and commit eight errors in what seemed to be a game that would never end. However, WVU got the run it needed in the top of the 13th to win 11-10 and push its record two games above .500 for the first time this season.
And veteran coach Randy Mazey did just about everything he could think of doing to keep this one from going into the loss column.
That's why Mazey made seven trips to the mound on Tuesday, even taking the routine bullpen work some of his weekend guys would normally get and transferring it to the field.
"I'd stay out here all dang night to win a game," Mazey said, adding, "and I thought we were for a while."
This was not a performance that either team will be inclined to add to their highlight videos at the end of the season. In fact, Marshall coach Jeff Waggoner was so disgusted with the way things were going that he got tossed arguing a call before the game went into extra innings, sparing him the disappointment of watching his team lose for the fifth straight time to the Mountaineers.
Mazey wasn't too enthused with what he saw, either.
"That's one of the ugliest games you'll ever see two teams play," he admitted. "But you know what, it's really hard to win an extra-inning game on the road. When you do that somebody has to do something really well. Our offense was really good again and once we got to Cody Wood on the mound, Cody threw really good."
It just took seven innings for that to happen after West Virginia had already blown an early 6-3 lead.
Then, Mazey went to sophomore righthander Alek Manoah in the 10th before turning senior B.J. Myers' scheduled bullpen session into a live, 17-pitch outing in the bottom of the 13th.
"We didn't pitch anybody out of character in order to win this game," Mazey noted. "Myers, if he didn't throw 20 pitches in the game he was going to throw it in the pen, so we might as well use him. We've converted Manoah to the back end, but he's been a starter so he can go pretty easily. Everybody was right on schedule."
Mazey said he was fearful the game might turn out this way during the dreary bus ride down to Charleston Tuesday afternoon.
"You ride down in a bus and it's raining the whole way," he said. "Guys get in their mind that maybe we are not even going to play tonight. Usually, after a rain delay you get some sloppiness and that's not us. We've played better than that."
Mazey did take some positives out of Tuesday night's win heading into this weekend's important series against Texas.
"When the game is on the line, on the road, all those road games early really help you win games like this when you get on the road," he noted. "To be good on the road you've got to practice being good on the road, and we got walked off a couple of times early in the year, and we won a couple of games, too. All those games early on were super-valuable experience to know that we can win games like this."
Now, West Virginia must turn its attention to one of the Big 12's upper-level teams this weekend when it faces the 19th-ranked Longhorns.
Oklahoma swept the Mountaineers earlier this season at OU; WVU also lost two out of three at Texas Tech and came up a little short in its recent three-game home series against league-leading Oklahoma State.
Presently, West Virginia is two games in the win column behind Baylor for sixth place in the conference standings and a game in the win column above Kansas State and Kansas.
Nevertheless, Texas (29-15, 11-4) is going to be a big challenge for West Virginia this weekend.
That means the Mountaineers are going to have to play much better than they did Tuesday night, and Mazey is confident they will.
"You don't have to motivate our guys to play against the Longhorns because they look at this series at the beginning of the year when the schedule comes out," he said. "We've got some Texas kids, and they take a lot of pride playing against Texas. It's one of the most storied traditions in the history of college baseball, so how could you not get excited about it?
"I think our guys will come out and play really, really hard this weekend," Mazey added.
They are likely to have large crowds supporting them as well. According to WVU senior associate athletic director Matt Wells, advance sales for Saturday's 4 p.m. game have been strong and a crowd of more than 3,000 is a possibility with good weather.
WVU could also top 7,000 for the weekend if the weather holds. Advance tickets are still available and can be purchased through WVUGAME.com.
Friday's series opener is scheduled to get underway at 6:30 p.m.; Saturday's game will start at 4 p.m. while getaway day for the Longhorns will begin at 1 p.m. on Sunday.
The game was as sloppy as the field on which the two teams were playing, the wet conditions clearly impacting play.
The Mountaineers and Thundering Herd combined to walk 20 batters and commit eight errors in what seemed to be a game that would never end. However, WVU got the run it needed in the top of the 13th to win 11-10 and push its record two games above .500 for the first time this season.
And veteran coach Randy Mazey did just about everything he could think of doing to keep this one from going into the loss column.
That's why Mazey made seven trips to the mound on Tuesday, even taking the routine bullpen work some of his weekend guys would normally get and transferring it to the field.
"I'd stay out here all dang night to win a game," Mazey said, adding, "and I thought we were for a while."
This was not a performance that either team will be inclined to add to their highlight videos at the end of the season. In fact, Marshall coach Jeff Waggoner was so disgusted with the way things were going that he got tossed arguing a call before the game went into extra innings, sparing him the disappointment of watching his team lose for the fifth straight time to the Mountaineers.
Mazey wasn't too enthused with what he saw, either.
"That's one of the ugliest games you'll ever see two teams play," he admitted. "But you know what, it's really hard to win an extra-inning game on the road. When you do that somebody has to do something really well. Our offense was really good again and once we got to Cody Wood on the mound, Cody threw really good."
It just took seven innings for that to happen after West Virginia had already blown an early 6-3 lead.
Then, Mazey went to sophomore righthander Alek Manoah in the 10th before turning senior B.J. Myers' scheduled bullpen session into a live, 17-pitch outing in the bottom of the 13th.
"We didn't pitch anybody out of character in order to win this game," Mazey noted. "Myers, if he didn't throw 20 pitches in the game he was going to throw it in the pen, so we might as well use him. We've converted Manoah to the back end, but he's been a starter so he can go pretty easily. Everybody was right on schedule."
Mazey said he was fearful the game might turn out this way during the dreary bus ride down to Charleston Tuesday afternoon.
"You ride down in a bus and it's raining the whole way," he said. "Guys get in their mind that maybe we are not even going to play tonight. Usually, after a rain delay you get some sloppiness and that's not us. We've played better than that."
Mazey did take some positives out of Tuesday night's win heading into this weekend's important series against Texas.
"When the game is on the line, on the road, all those road games early really help you win games like this when you get on the road," he noted. "To be good on the road you've got to practice being good on the road, and we got walked off a couple of times early in the year, and we won a couple of games, too. All those games early on were super-valuable experience to know that we can win games like this."
Now, West Virginia must turn its attention to one of the Big 12's upper-level teams this weekend when it faces the 19th-ranked Longhorns.
Oklahoma swept the Mountaineers earlier this season at OU; WVU also lost two out of three at Texas Tech and came up a little short in its recent three-game home series against league-leading Oklahoma State.
Presently, West Virginia is two games in the win column behind Baylor for sixth place in the conference standings and a game in the win column above Kansas State and Kansas.
Nevertheless, Texas (29-15, 11-4) is going to be a big challenge for West Virginia this weekend.
That means the Mountaineers are going to have to play much better than they did Tuesday night, and Mazey is confident they will.
"You don't have to motivate our guys to play against the Longhorns because they look at this series at the beginning of the year when the schedule comes out," he said. "We've got some Texas kids, and they take a lot of pride playing against Texas. It's one of the most storied traditions in the history of college baseball, so how could you not get excited about it?
"I think our guys will come out and play really, really hard this weekend," Mazey added.
They are likely to have large crowds supporting them as well. According to WVU senior associate athletic director Matt Wells, advance sales for Saturday's 4 p.m. game have been strong and a crowd of more than 3,000 is a possibility with good weather.
WVU could also top 7,000 for the weekend if the weather holds. Advance tickets are still available and can be purchased through WVUGAME.com.
Friday's series opener is scheduled to get underway at 6:30 p.m.; Saturday's game will start at 4 p.m. while getaway day for the Longhorns will begin at 1 p.m. on Sunday.
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