What to know about Virginia and Kansas State ahead of the Charlottesville Super Regional (2024)

He couldn’t hide his eagerness because of the manner in which Virginia swept its way through the Charlottesville Regional this past weekend.

Not even a bit.

“We pitched it the best we’ve pitched it all year,” 21st-year Cavaliers coach Brian O’Connor said with a wide smile on Sunday night.

Perhaps, with six College World Series appearances under his belt, he knows what quality pitching can do for a club in the sport’s most pressure-packed games. Or maybe, his giddiness was simply because UVa waited on its pitching to make that kind of leap for weeks.

Jay Woolfolk’s eight innings of two-run ball for a regional-final gem on Sunday to beat Mississippi State gave UVa back-to-back quality starts — defined as at least six innings thrown with three or fewer earned runs allowed — for the first time this season.

Evan Blanco, the Cavaliers’ top and most consistent starter this year, went six innings and gave up three earned runs in Saturday’s winner’s bracket game against the Bulldogs. The Hoos were only a third of an inning shy from getting three straight quality starts since Joe Savino lasted 5.2 frames of two-run ball with eight strikeouts in Friday’s regional-opening win over Penn.

“I’m excited. Like, I can’t sit still,” O’Connor said. “What our pitching did this [past] weekend and our defense, was awesome.”

Add in that he needed to use only three relievers over the three games — Chase Hungate twice and Matt Augustin and Angelo Tonas each once — and they combined for 7.1 scoreless with eight strikeouts, O’Connor and the Cavaliers probably feel like they head into the Charlottesville Super Regional firmly confident in their pitching options.

UVa (44-15), the No. 12-overall seed in the NCAA tournament, hosts Kansas State (35-24) at Disharoon Park for the best-of-three series beginning Friday at 7 p.m.

Saturday’s contest is scheduled for 3 p.m. and if the teams need to play on Sunday, first pitch will be at 3 p.m.

The winner advances to the College World Series. And beyond the Cavaliers’ pitching trending positively, here’s what to know about the Hoos and the Wildcats in advance of the Super Regional.

Familiar face leads K-State’s turnaround

Former Virginia Tech coach Pete Hughes was hired at Kansas State after the 2018 campaign, and he’s tried to change the trajectory of the Wildcats’ program since then. He had a four-year stint at Oklahoma and a year off between his seven seasons in Blacksburg and getting to K-State.

“When I was on sabbatical looking for my next job,” Hughes told reporters in Manhattan, Kansas, this week, “I knew that I wouldn’t go to a program that couldn’t go to Omaha. That’s what I got in this profession to do. It took one meeting with [Kansas State athletic director] Gene Taylor to know that he wanted to resource this program to go to Omaha. He had the same goal that I had.

“We talk about going to Omaha every single day,” Hughes said. “If you come into my office, there’s an Omaha standard above my desk. It’s how we go about our business every day, that’s how I want our coaching staff and our players to go about their business every day. You have to raise expectations when you come into a job where that’s not said every day. You have to preach it and believe in it.”

The Wildcats had four losing seasons in the prior five years to Hughes’ arrival. In their baseball history, they’d only been to the NCAA postseason four times before this year. This is their second ever Super Regional.

Already beat a perennial power

K-State was on the road at the Fayetteville Regional hosted by No. 5-overall seed Arkansas this past weekend, and on Saturday night in the winner’s bracket game, the Wildcats were tasked with facing the Razorbacks and their ace Hagen Smith, one of the top pitching prospects for this summer’s MLB Draft.

They beat Smith with a six-run fifth inning, punctuated by shortstop Kaelen Culpepper’s three-run, opposite-field homer that gave Kansas State a 6-2 advantage and quieted a hostile environment at Baum-Walker Stadium.

The Wildcats used the momentum from that victory and won the regional title game against Southeast Missouri State on Sunday.

Former teammates, now foes

Culpepper and Kansas State closer Tyson Neighbors were Team USA Collegiate National Team teammates last summer with Woolfolk and Cavaliers standout shortstop Griff O’Ferrall in games against Chinese Taipei and Japan.

O’Ferrall and Culpepper are considered the best college shortstops for the MLB Draft, according to MLB Pipeline.

O’Ferrall, a finalist for the Brooks Wallace Award, which is given to the nation’s best shortstop annually, enters the Charlottesville Super Regional hitting .331 with five homers and 49 RBI to go along with 62 runs scored and 17 stolen bases.

His impact was clear this past weekend, too. He scored a crucial add-on run against Penn after he singled, stole second and advanced to third on a passed ball in the seventh inning. O’Ferrall made a key put out also by keeping a tag on Dakota Jordan, who tried to steal second with two outs in the eighth inning of the regional championship game only to slide off the bag, enabling O’Ferrall’s steady hold to end Mississippi State’s late-inning threat.

Culpepper is batting .325 with 11 homers and 56 RBI. He hit two home runs in the regional.

Neighbors’ nine saves are tied for 21st most in the country. He recorded a 10-out save against Arkansas on Saturday.

Woolfolk, who struck out seven Bulldogs, in his stellar start, said he couldn’t help but to feed off the lively sold-out Hoos faithful at Disharoon Park.

“Just hearing the crowd erupt after three outs,” Woolfolk said, “it was probably the best feeling I’ve had on the mound.”

Hoos due for more power

Maybe more surprising than the Cavaliers’ pitching getting right last week was that their powerful offense lacked power throughout the regional.

Second baseman Henry Godbout’s second-inning, three-run homer against Penn was the lone longball of regional action for UVa, which could mean the squad that smacked 113 home runs during the regular season is due for more this weekend against the Wildcats, whose 73 home runs allowed are the third most given up in the Big 12 this year.

Four Cavaliers — Harrison Didawick (23), Jacob Ference (17), Heny Ford (17) and Casey Saucke (13) — have double-digit homer numbers and Didawick needs only one more to set a single-season school record for home runs.

Watch the Wildcats’ speed

If the Hoos’ season-long offensive identity is their prodigious power, then Kansas State is best known for its speed.

The Wildcats’ 135 stolen bases are the 10th most in Division I and the most for any school in a power conference. They swiped eight bases over their three games in the Fayetteville Regional.

Center fielder Brendan Jones, Kansas State’s leadoff man, has racked up 39 stolen bases, which are the sixth most for any individual in the country and he does it at an incredibly efficient rate. He’s only been thrown out twice.