MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Ninth-ranked regional host West Virginia (40-14) grabbed the lead with a five-run fourth inning and defeated Binghamton baseball (31-21) 10-1 in the Bearcats' NCAA Regional opener in front of 4,120 fans Friday night at Kendrick Family Ballpark.
Binghamton now will face second-seed Wake Forest (38-20) in an elimination game at noon Saturday. The Demon Deacons lost the Regional opener to third-seeded Kentucky 6-5.
The Bearcats kept the national 16
th-seed off the scoreboard in six of eight innings but WVU did enough damage in two frames to decide the game.
"We saw firsthand a pretty dynamic baseball team," head coach
Tim Sinicki said. "If you had told me before the game we would have kept them off the board in six of eight innings, I'd have been pretty happy with that. But they took advantage of the opportunities that were given them, as good teams do. We walked some guys and hit some guys and then we saw them take advantage with speed and power and that's how you get to that final score. Credit to them for taking advantage of our miscues ... they are a really sound ballclub."
The Bearcats led 1-0 through three innings before the Mountaineers belted two home runs in the five-run fourth. West Virginia added five runs in the fifth – the last three coming on a bloop double to shallow left field.
Binghamton took its first lead at an NCAA Regional since 2009 when they pushed across a run in the second inning. Senior left fielder
Zack Kent led off with a double into the left field corner. Kent moved to third on a wild pitch and scored on an RBI grounder by junior DH
Zach Anderson. On the scoring play, Anderson hit a ball to third and the throw came home but Kent evaded the tag and the call stood on video replay.
Down 5-1, the Bearcats loaded the bases in the fifth inning but a called strike three ended the threat. Sophomore first baseman
Steven Kraus led off and reached on an infield error. Singles by senior shortstop
Mike Stellrecht and sophomore right fielder
Braylen Gonzalez brought the tying run to the plate.
Junior starter
Conner Griffin worked three shutout innings before WVU struck in the fourth. Griffin hit 95 on the radar gun with his first pitch of the game, topped 97 shortly thereafter and struck out four.
Junior
Jackson Mitchell worked two innings and struck out a pair. Junior
Jake Dally pitched 1.1 innings and sophomore
Brady Lesiak worked the final 1.2 frames.
Freshman
Mason Holloway (3-3, 5.14 ERA) gets the start against Wake Forest on Saturday.
