West Virginia stuns Cats with five-run 9th to force Monday title game

A year after eliminating Kentucky from the NCAA Tournament with a six-run eighth inning at the Clemson Regional, West Virginia set a new tourney record with a five-run ninth inning to beat the Wildcats 11-9 and force a championship showdown on Monday in the Morgantown Regional.

“Special game. One of the best games I’ve ever been part of,” said Mountaineers head coach Steve Sabins, who likened the latest edition of the burgeoning rivalry to a “bar fight.”

Top-seeded West Virginia (42-15) staved off elimination by taking advantage of 10 walks, two hit batters, and a balk for a run by a much-maligned Kentucky pitching staff. The Mountaineers scored a run on all three varieties, as well as a fourth on a UK error, and threw out a runner at home by more than 15 feet.

All of those miscues contributed to a rough outcome for the Cats.

A dejected UK head coach Nick Mingione said he was “sick to my stomach” after the bitter defeat, but added, “Give (West Virginia) credit. They had a great comeback. A great comeback.”

The Cats’ starter, Ben Cleaver, could not make it out of the first inning after issuing two walks and hitting two batters to begin the game. The junior left-hander threw just 23 pitches before exiting.

Still, Kentucky (33-22) got some magnificent bullpen work from Chase Alderman and Nile Adcock and back-to-back home runs by Jayce Tharnish and Tyler Bell in the seventh inning to seemingly give the Cats a comfortable lead at 9-6 going to the ninth inning.

But things unraveled quickly as third baseman Caeden Cloud committed an error on a routine grounder by WVU leadoff man Brodie Kresser. Ben Lumsden then drew a walk before 9-hole hitter Tyrus Hall recorded his first hit of the season on a breaking-ball pitch to load the bases with no outs.

Kentucky reliever Jackson Soucie (0-2), who earned a save in Saturday’s win over the Mountaineers, issued a bases-loaded walk to the only batter he would face to make it a 9-7 game. Oliver Boone entered from the UK bullpen and gave up a sacrifice fly to Gavin Kelly to cut the lead to one, then committed a balk to tie it at 9.

The next batter, Paul Schoenfeld, then delivered the biggest blow, driving a hanging breaking ball from Boone deep over the right-field wall for a two-run home run that may have saved the Mountaineers’ season.

Kentucky had one last shot as the home team batting in the bottom of the ninth, but WVU’s Ben McDougal (1-0) worked around a two-out single to close the game. He pitched the final five innings for the depleted Mountaineers, allowing just three hits — two of them solo home runs — while walking none and striking out six.

In a stark contrast to the Kentucky staff, West Virginia walked only three batters on the night. The Cats threw 201 pitches collectively, only 113 for strikes.

Kentucky lost despite getting two home runs from Bell and three hits from both Tharnish and Braxton Van Cleave as part of a 13-hit night for the Cats.

“I told them that they’re not leaving this field unless they leave everything that happened here,” Mingione said. “It’s over. You have to move on, you have to move on. This is what you do in life. There are times where things are gonna go your way, and there are times they’re not… 90% of life is how you respond to what happens to you. It’s 90% how you respond. We have an opportunity.”

“Coach Minge has preached to us the two years I’ve been here that everything expires at midnight, no matter if it’s a good day or a bad day,” Bell said. “… Just living like that, the whole team just buying into it, has allowed us to have consistent success.”

Up Next:

Kentucky and West Virginia will play for the third time in the Morgantown Regional, a rubber match with a chance to host the super regionals on the line after No. 1 overall seed UCLA was eliminated on Sunday in the opposite bracket. First pitch has been slated for 6 p.m. ET.

FINAL UK BOX: West Virginia 11, Kentucky 9 pic.twitter.com/5oCLTHEGzt

— Jeff Drummond (@JDrumUK) June 1, 2026