LAWRENCE, Kan. — Junior second baseman Kyle Gray extended his hit streak to 21 consecutive games with a pair of home runs, but it was not enough as the WVU baseball team suffered a 13-3 loss Saturday against Kansas.
On a hot, sun-soaked day at Hoglund Ballpark, the Mountaineers (24-20, 7-10 Big 12) saw their four-game win streak come to an end. WVU took a 2-0 lead in the second inning, but the Jayhawks (21-25, 4-12 Big 12) responded with runs in each of the next five innings.
The victory came a day after the Mountaineers pounded Kansas, 21-3, in the series opener on Friday.
Gray continued his hot hitting and had his third multi-home run game of the year. He hit his 11th and 12th homers of the season and now has 15 in his career. Gray’s 21-game hit streak is the longest by a Mountaineer since Justin McDavid’s 21-game streak in 2010, while his 12 homers are tied for ninth-most in a single season in program history.
Along with Gray (22 games), junior right fielder Darius Hill (20) and sophomore Marques Inman (19) also extended their career-long reached-base streaks, with a hit a piece. Freshman third baseman Tyler Doanes also had a hit, extending his streak to a eight games.
Sophomore right-handed starter Kade Strowd suffered the loss, just his second in Big 12 play, and falls to 4-4 on the season.
In 4.1 innings, he allowed five runs on eight hits with four strikeouts and two walks.
Gray gave the Mountaineers a 2-0 lead in the second inning with a two-run home run.
His second homer of the weekend scored Inman, who led off the inning with a double.
KU cut the lead to 2-1 in the third on a hit batter with the bases loaded and two outs, but Strowd got a groundout to end the inning. WVU stranded the bases loaded in the top of the fourth with two outs, and the Wildcats tied the game at 2-2 in the bottom half on a sacrifice fly.
Kansas took its first lead of the series in the fifth, at 5-2, scoring three runs on four hits. A double and single were followed by back-to-back RBI doubles, the second scoring two runs after Strowd was relieved by senior right-hander Shane Ennis.
The Mountaineers left two on in the top of the sixth, and the Jayhawks extended their lead to 11-2 in the bottom of the inning. A two-RBI double scored the first two runs, and Brendt Citta added a two-run home run to center. The final two runs of the inning came on an RBI single and a wild pitch. Citta hit his second home run of the day in the seventh to make it 13-2.
Gray added his second home run of the day in the eighth inning to cut the WVU deficit to 13-3, but the Mountaineers could not get any closer.
The series concludes, at 1 p.m. today. The game will be streamed via ESPN3.
