MORGANTOWN — For a moment, we flash back to last June. Only minutes had passed since West Virginia was eliminated by North Carolina in the College World Series.
Just what was brimming on Steve Sabins’ emotional sleeve at that moment was, in all likelihood, dozens of different feelings.
Exhaustion was there. Disappointment was there, too. A sense of enormous pride and great sorrow weren’t far behind.
It’s been nearly a month now since the Mountaineers’ magical ride ended in Omaha, Neb. The memories are just that. Paul Schoenfeld’s home run against Kentucky is no longer flying through the night air. The next pitch Maxx Yehl throws will be for a Kansas City Royals’ minor league team.
If you’re still somehow wondering how it all came to pass, Sabins summarized it quite nicely in that postgame press conference.
“If I wasn’t in Omaha, I can promise you I’d be outworking everybody who was,” he said.
It was an answer to a question about recruiting, and to be sure, Sabins is tied to the art of acquiring talent as McDonald’s is to hamburgers.
You know most of the story, and if not, it’s not hard to comprehend. Over his first 11 years in Morgantown, Sabins became synonymous with finding productive players where few other schools even bothered to look.
That meant scouring the Division II ranks, Canada and finding hidden gems who were underrecruited and had something to prove.
Season after season, that formula got WVU a little further, a little more competitive and a little more respect.
Recruiting doors that were once closed back in the day, well, some of them opened once Sabins got going. Once WVU started reaching NCAA tournaments and competing for Big 12 titles, a few more opened and so on.
Which brings us to our current topic: What can the man accomplish when more doors are open than closed?
The answer to that question is impressive, at least once you see it all laid out on paper (check out the graphic below).
For instance, Gavin Kelly is projected as one of the top picks in the 2027 MLB Amateur Draft and he finished with 63 RBIs last season for the Mountaineers.
Sabins signed three players – two junior-college transfers and one senior out of the transfer portal – who finished with more.
Armani Guzman set a school record with 42 stolen bases last season. Sabins signed a guy who had more.
As a team, WVU hit a total of 58 home runs on its way to the national semifinals. Sabins has signed two guys who combined for more home runs last season than the entire Mountaineers’ roster.
Obviously there are asterisks that come with those stats. To put it simply, Collin Coonradt and Ryan Piekutoski had amazing power numbers last season at the junior-college level and not against Big 12 and Division I pitching.
Jack Cannon put up his numbers at Le Moyne, where the Dolphins played just one three-game series last season against a Power Four Conference team (North Carolina) and that series did not go well for the Dolphins.
And so the biggest word we can use for WVU’s 2027 lineup is “potential,” which is the single-most dangerous word in all of college athletics, because it shifts the focus from current production to unproven promises.
What we can also tell you about next season is either Sabins is going to have a lot of fun or headaches coming up with his own lineup.
For example, incoming freshman outfielder Henkel Acevedo is an awesome get for the Mountaineers. He’s 6-foot-4 and 220 pounds. A few weeks ago, at the Academy Baseball Association home run derby, Acevedo put on a show with 11 home runs in a single round, including seven in a row.
Perfect Game ranked Acevedo 141st overall nationally coming out of high school, and we can’t get him into WVU’s 2027 starting lineup.
Chase Ecker stole 27 bases as a freshman last season at William & Mary. Junior-college transfer Seth Williams batted .347 with 12 home runs at Galveston (Texas) College. They may be fighting for playing time.
Now, here is the good news. Kelly and Guzman are back. So are shortstop Matt Ineich and third baseman Tyrus Hall.
That leaves five spots open. Three of those, we think, are going to be Cannon, Coonradt and Piekutoski. Those three guys all hit well above .400 last season, and it’s not their most impressive stat.
Coonradt hit 37 home runs at Johnson County (Kan.) Community College and drove in 109 runs. Nice, but not as much as his .567 on-base percentage.
Piekutoski hit 25 home runs at USC Sumter (S.C.). Get this, he was on base 63% of the time.
And Cannon, well his on-base percentage at Le Moyne was just .504, but his .440 batting average, 10 home runs and 51 stolen bases seemingly make him a heck of a leadoff guy.
None of those three may be WVU’s most anticipated newcomer. That just may be redshirt freshman catcher Cash Williams, who transferred in from Tennessee.
Williams, an Oklahoma native, was the 10th-ranked catcher in the nation in the Class of 2025. As a high school senior, Williams batted .505 with 14 doubles, 12 home runs, 48 RBIs and 26 stolen bases.
What you may not know is Williams was also one heck of a prep quarterback, leading Choctaw High School to Oklahoma’s Class 6A state title as a senior.
At Tennessee, Williams got caught up in a numbers game. The Volunteers already had four experienced catchers, and so Williams was redshirted. He still has four seasons of eligibility remaining.
Our designated hitter is sophomore Colton Sims, who was one of Sabins’ top high school recruits last season. Sims was ranked as the No. 16 third baseman nationally coming out of Shawnee (Kan.) Mission East.
The emergence of Hall limited Sims to just eight games last season at WVU, but at 6-foot-3 and 220 pounds, Sims could be another power bat in what just may be a feared power-hitting lineup. Sims is currently playing for the Richmond Flying Mummies in the Northwoods League.
So, what exactly can Sabins accomplish recruiting-wise after leading WVU to the College World Series? Potentially, he may have followed it up with WVU’s best offensive lineup ever.
“It’s not the rich always has to get richer in these situations, right?” Sabins said. “I’m pretty sure we’re going to capitalize on going to Omaha and recruit the hell out of that.”
