Kentucky baseball's slippery slope continues in gut-wrenching loss
It’s not that Kentucky isn’t talented. It’s not that they don’t play hard. But once again, the little things unraveled a game they had no business losing. The Wildcats dropped their fifth straight game Friday, this time a 4–3 heartbreaker to West Virginia in the opening round of the NCAA Clemson Regional. And just like in the four losses that came before, Kentucky held the lead—only to watch it disappear in painfully familiar fashion.
Now, the season hangs by a thread.
A fast start that fizzled
Kentucky came out swinging. Ryan Schwartz opened the scoring with a ringing double off the wall, then came around to score after a Patrick Herrera single and a well-placed Kyuss Gargett squeeze bunt that turned into a hit. After a daring double steal by Herrera and Gargett, Devin Burkes hit a high hopper up the middle that West Virginia misplayed, allowing two more to score. Just like that, the Wildcats had a 3–0 lead and early momentum.
But the script flipped fast.
In the fifth, Kentucky gifted the Mountaineers two runs after a throwing error and a hit batter loaded the bases. What should have been a routine inning-ending grounder turned into a wild throw and two unearned runs. West Virginia tied the game an inning later, then walked it off in the ninth on a sacrifice fly.
Same story, different day
If it feels like you’ve seen this before, it’s because you have. In each of their last five losses, Kentucky has led. And in each, they’ve watched those leads slip away due to poor execution in high-leverage moments—routine plays that simply haven’t been made.
Friday was no exception. Kentucky committed two errors, hit two batters, and missed critical chances to add on when the bats went quiet late. The Wildcats managed just five hits, struck out eight times, and left eight runners on base.
Ben Cleaver pitched well enough to win, allowing just one earned run in six innings, but got little support from the defense behind him. Simon Gregersen took the loss after a clean eighth gave way to the ninth-inning breakdown.
A steep climb ahead
Now Kentucky finds itself in survival mode.
The Wildcats will face USC Upstate today at noon in an elimination game. A win would earn them a shot at the loser of Clemson vs. West Virginia. From there, they would need two more wins to reach Super Regional.
That’s a brutal ask for a team that hasn’t shown it can finish games.
This isn’t about talent. Kentucky has enough of it to make a run. But five straight losses—each more agonizing than the last—tell the story of a team that’s lost its grip on the fundamentals. Defensive lapses, base-running mistakes, and missed situational execution have all piled up at the worst possible time.
What's next
Do-or-die time has arrived. If Kentucky wants to keep its season alive—and justify the expectations it carried into May—it has to clean it up. Every pitch, every throw, every routine play now carries weight.
The margin for error is gone. All that’s left is the fight. It starts with USC Upstate at Noon.