In finishing sweep of West Virginia, Texas goes from 'the improbable to Big 12 champions'

In the race for the Big 12 championship, Texas caught West Virginia at the finish line.

Texas jumped out to an early lead Saturday afternoon and then held off the Mountaineers 7-3 at UFCU Disch-Falk Field. With the win in the final game of the regular season, Texas (38-18, 15-9) tied the No. 6 Mountaineers (39-16, 15-9) and No. 25 Oklahoma State (37-16, 15-9) atop the Big 12.

West Virginia entered the final weekend with a three-game lead over the Longhorns and a two-game cushion with Oklahoma State. Texas, however, beat WVU three times by a combined score of 29-9 to secure the third conference championship of David Pierce's seven-year tenure.

"It was just awesome for them to go win a championship when we were basically counted out," said Pierce, whose team recorded its fourth sweep of the season. "We went from the impossible to the improbable to Big 12 champions."

After Tanner Witt opened the game by retiring West Virginia in order, Texas led off its half of the first inning with back-to-back singles by Jared Thomas and Peyton Powell. Dylan Campbell then extended his school-record hitting streak to 33 games with an RBI double before Texas brought home its second run on a Garret Guillemette sacrifice fly and Jalin Flores' two-run single.

The four-run flourish during a first inning that West Virginia starting pitcher Ben Hampton failed to finish continued a trend for Texas. To open this series, UT took a 1-0 lead in the first inning of Thursday's 12-2 win. The Longhorns responded to an early score by West Virginia in Friday's 10-4 triumph with four first-inning runs of their own.

At the top of the batting order, Thomas, Powell and Campbell combined to go 9-for-9 with seven runs and two RBIs during the three first innings of the series. Factoring in the two wins over San Jose State that ended last week, the trio has collected 13 hits, scored 11 times and hit two homers over 16 first-inning at-bats.

"I think that's a big part of our offense," said Thomas, a freshman first baseman. "Us going out there and getting the party started early kind of fires our whole dugout up. Whenever we have a lot of energy and us top-of-the-order guys can get stuff going, we're really hard to beat."

Added senior Eric Kennedy, who bats sixth: "It just sets the table for the whole game. Getting those runs early gets us going and gets the flow of the offense going really well. And then it also eases our pitchers a little bit knowing that they can just fill it up and our defense will make some plays."

Texas eventually found itself leading 6-1 before the Mountaineers attempted to rally. In the seventh inning, West Virginia hit a two-run homer and then got leadoff hitter Tevin Tucker aboard with one out.

With Big 12 Player of the Year frontrunner JJ Wetherholt due up, Pierce replaced Travis Sthele with right-hander Zane Morehouse. Wetherholt hammered the one pitch he saw from Morehouse to Flores, and the shifted shortstop turned the threat-extinguishing double play.

Morehouse stranded a Mountaineer at third base in the eighth before West Virginia made one last charge in the final frame. With one out, West Virginia had runners on the corners. But reliever Charlie Hurley, who replaced Kobe Minchey after the freshman issued a four-pitch walk to lead off the inning, got a double-play grounder to end the game.

"Both those kids have to build off of that and understand that they gain more innings as they produce," Pierce said of Morehouse and Hurley. "Both of them produced really well."

Texas actually celebrated the final out twice Saturday. Since the call at first base on the double play — which was started at third base by Powell and included a throw from second baseman Jack O'Dowd — was close, the umpiring crew reviewed it and Longhorns were sent back to the dugout and bullpen. After a short break, it was confirmed that Texas had completed the championship-clinching highlight.

"I wasn't worried at all," Thomas said. "I knew that I was on the base. I had a pretty good feeling that the throw beat him. Them going into review made us appreciate it that much more."

Key play: Texas built a 6-0 lead in the third inning behind a solo homer from Flores, who was making his seventh start of the season at shortstop. Mitchell Daly had started at shortstop in 46 of the first 49 games, but he last started on May 7.

Flores went 2-for-3 with three RBIs. He also made a leaping catch of a liner in the fourth inning.

Notable number: 2. Freshman Jayden Duplantier recorded two at-bats as the designated hitter. He was replaced by pinch-hitter Ace Whitehead in the eighth inning.

Tanner Carlson had been the designated hitter in 10 of the team's previous 13 games, but the senior injured his arm when he was hit by a first-inning pitch on Friday. According to a team spokesperson, Carlson will see a specialist on Monday. Pierce said in a pregame radio interview that Carlson, who's hitting .306, could miss four to six weeks.

Up next: Due to a tiebreaker, Texas also secured the top seed in the Big 12 Tournament. The Longhorns will meet Kansas (24-30, 8-16) at Arlington's Globe Life Field at 12:30 p.m. on Wednesday. Earlier this month, Texas went 2-1 against the Jayhawks in Lawrence.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Texas sweeps West Virginia to earn share of Big 12 baseball title