Vicky Graff Photo
Kentucky’s season is over but, true to form, it fought until the very end.
The Wildcats eliminated top-seed and regional host Clemson 16-4 in Sunday’s afternoon game then had West Virginia on the ropes multiple times in the nightcap before the Mountaineers scored six runs with two outs in the eighth inning to complete their unlikely comeback for a 13-12 victory at Doug Kinsmore Stadium.
A season of gutting one-run, late-inning defeats ended in the same fashion but the conclusion didn’t define the season. UK (31-26) fought through a rash of injuries, a roster with 30 new players and one of the nation’s most difficult schedules to come within three victories of a return to Omaha.
But this group of Wildcats also helped the program to its third straight regional for the first time in history and saw multiple young players break onto the scene. Also, six Cats were named to the All-Clemson Regional Team: Hudson Brown, Cole Hage, Carson Hansen, Luke Lawrence, James McCoy and Ethan Walker.
NOTES
- Kentucky is 31-26 on the season.
- UK won 30 games for the fourth consecutive season.
- UK Coach Nick Mingione is in his ninth season at the helm and now owns a 293-192 career record.
- Mingione is the second-winningest coach in school history.
- UK is 14-9 in the month of June under Coach Mingione.
- Mingione now is 14-10 in the NCAA Tournament.
- He is 11-4 in four NCAA Regionals.
- Mingione now is 1-0 vs. Clemson.
- Mingione now is 1-2 vs. West Virginia.
UK-WVU Baseball
Photos by Vicky Graff
3 Responses
Hate to see the team and the season end like this. Overall, they had a very good year but had problems holding leads toward the end of the season. The team seemed to lose some mojo after taking last UT series. If you can’t hold two 5 run leads in same game, the outcome will be devastating.
That 8th inning was unbelievable. For them to do that much damage in the 8th inning is our season in a nutshell. We have some great young talent that hopefully we can keep and be even better next year!
Just couldn’t get outs when they had to have them. Errors were also extremely costly in these games.
Hopefully more of these guys stick around for next year instead of a total remix.