Kansas Baseball wins second consecutive series to start the season

Coming off a successful first series of the season, the Kansas Jayhawks returned to the baseball field to take on the Oakland Golden Grizzlies for a four-game series over the weekend. By all measures, the weekend was a big success, but the final game of the series showed that the Jayhawks still have some areas for improvement.  

Game 1

Kansas jumped out to an early lead in the first inning and never looked back in a 7-0 victory to start the series. The offense started in the first inning with a Luke Leto bases-loaded two-run single.  Jake English hit his first career home run in the second inning. Kansas scored three more runs in the fourth. Kodey Shojinaga's bases-loaded sac fly scored one, followed by a Cole Elvis double, scoring two more. In the sixth inning, Mike Koszewski laid down a sac bunt making the score 7-0. Head coach Fitzgerald said, "I thought our hitters did a really nice job, and once again, we played really solid defense. I thought it was a great mentality win, a good team win, and our guys were ready from the first pitch."

The pitching was flawlessly executed led by Collin Baumgartner, who continued his success from his first outing of the season. Baumgartner threw five innings of no hits or runs. His only hiccup was two walks but covered that with five strikeouts. 

 Coach Fitzgerald said, "Then, Baumgartner with five innings pitched, two walks, and five punch outs. I even thought on the walks they were really competitive at-bats." 

 Baumgartner talked about his first outing saying, "We came out with a lot of energy. The defense was great behind me. We jumped out to a two-run lead right off the bat, and we continued to score a lot of runs. It’s really easy to pitch when you have the lead like that. Coach Scott and Coach Fitzgerald really understand my game a lot. They understand what pitches work for me. They do a great job on the scouting reports week in and week out, and they follow that to a tee. I just go out there and pitch at that point. I’m super thankful to have them.” The shutout was the first of the season for the Jayhawks and the first since May 21st, 2021 against Kansas State.

Game 2

The Kansas Jayhawks continued their success, earning their third-straight win, 4-1. The tone of the game was set by starting pitcher Sam Ireland. Coach Fitzgerald said, “It starts on the mound, and Sam went five innings and allowed one run on three hits with no walks and five punchouts. Two of the three hits came in the sixth, and he sat for a while in between the fifth and the sixth. He was at 71 pitches going into the inning, so we stuck with him. He really competed."  

After Ireland, the baseball was given to Gavin Brasosky. Brasosky pitched four innings surrendering only one hit, one walk, zero runs, and two strikeouts while recording the save. This is now two consecutive weeks in which Brasosky has come out of the bullpen and pitched four shutout innings.

Offensively, get used to hearing the name Collier Cranford, as he started things off for the Jayhawks in the first inning with a triple. Luke Leto immediately followed that up with an RBI double to centerfield. Jackson Klein, who started in his first career game and recorded his first career at-bat, roped a double to left-center, scoring Leto and giving the Jayhawks a 2-0 lead. Klein came around and scored on a Michael Brooks hit to the right-center gap, increasing the Jayhawks' lead to 3-0. 

 Kansas tacked on its final run of the game in the seventh inning when Mike Koszewski hit an RBI double, scoring Jackson Cobb. The Jayhawks are displaying good vision at the plate, and coach Fitzgerald talked about the first-inning success, "There was some timely hitting in the first and good at-bats that we strung together early. Overall, good team effort, and the guys were locked in.”

Game 3

The Kansas Jayhawks offense made it easy for the starting pitching as the Jayhawks exploded for 26 runs. This looked more like a football game than a baseball game. Before we get into the onslaught of runs, Hunter Cranton pitched well throwing five innings allowing seven hits, three runs, two walks, and four strikeouts. Coach Fitzgerald talked about the pitching performance saying, "You look at the pitching, and Cranton gave up seven hits but only three runs. Then, [Stone] Evers, [Toby] Haarer, and [JJ] Tylicki came in and threw up zeros. Great team effort.”

The offense was very impressive scoring 26 runs which is the most runs scored since March 28th, 1997. The highlights included a 12-run sixth inning, seven home runs, and 22 hits. The seven home runs tied a program record set in 1984. Jake English had two home runs, a solo shot in the first inning and a two-run shot in the sixth. Two-run home runs were hit by Luke Leto (1st inning), Janson Reeder (4th inning), and Cole Elvis (6th inning). Kody Shoginaga (3rd inning) and Collier Cranford (4th inning) added solo shots. 

Coach Fitzgerald was pleased with the offense saying, "I thought our timing was really good. I thought our preparation was good. That was our best batting practice of the year. Tip your cap to the guys for really executing. Coach Hancock put together a great game plan against their starter and we got to him early. I thought our guys were on time all day. Equally as impressive [as scoring 26 runs] was their approach. I don’t think we gave really any at-bats away. To be able to do that, score that many runs, have 46 at-bats, and only punch out five times is a testament to the approach. I thought they were super locked in."

Game 4

The Jayhawks would hiccup in the final game of the series falling to the Golden Grizzlies 6-3. Ethan Bradford struggled in his first start for Kansas, pitching just one inning while surrendering three hits, four runs, two walks, and two strikeouts. And the offense sputtered in this game, unable to carry over the electric performance from game 3. Jake English would hit a sacrifice fly scoring Jackson Klein in the first inning. In the sixth inning, Luke Leto would hit a home run to cut the Kansas deficit to 4-2. In the same inning, Kody Shojinaga singled to left field scoring Chase Jans from third, but Michael Brooks would get thrown out at home. Oakland responded, and the Jayhawks were not able to get on the board anymore in the game. 

 These are the games where you learn from your mistakes and keep playing good baseball. Coach Fitzgerald said, "This loss doesn’t change anything in terms of where we need to go. We have to learn from it and move on. Winning baseball is simple, but it’s often tough to execute. We are like every baseball team of all time – if we play winning baseball we will be just fine, and if we don’t, we will struggle like we did today."

Up Next

The Kansas Jayhawks will temporarily leave the state of Texas and will head to Nashville, Tennessee to square off against Belmont in a three-game series. The first game is on Friday, March 3rd, and the first pitch is anticipated at 4:00 pm CST.  

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