West Virginia baseball earned a comeback win on Saturday, staying undefeated on the season in a 5-4 win over Lipscomb.
The Mountaineers trailed 2-0 in the first, quickly answering before Michael Perazza hit a go-ahead sacrifice-fly in the seventh while the Mountaineer bullpen gave up one run across five innings to secure the win.
Griffin Kirn took the ball for the opening game of a four-game series for the Mountaineers, making his second start in a West Virginia uniform.
Kirn would walk the first batter he faced, but picked him off, before hitting the second batter of the inning. The third batter, Parks Bouck, worked the count in his favor, before hitting a two-run home run, to left field, giving them a 2-0 lead in the first.
West Virginia answered in the second, doing so in an unconventional way. Brodie Kresser singled to start the inning before Skylar King followed suit with a single of his own. Kresser advanced to third on a fly out, before King attempted a steal of second, getting thrown out in the process, but Kresser scored before King was retired, cutting the score to 2-1.
Kirn would still struggle with command, but he was able to keep the Bison off the board. In the meantime, WVU scored the next two runs, tying the game in the fourth, before taking a lead in the fifth.
Kyle West singled and advanced to second on an error to lead off the fourth inning, and he eventually scored on a single from Armani Guzman, tying the game at 2-2. Then in the fifth, Logan Sauve started the inning with a single, stealing second, before he advanced to third on a passed ball. He would then score on an infield single from Alex Marot, putting the Mountaineers ahead by one.
Lipscomb would answer back in the bottom of the inning, as Kirn gave up his second home run of the day, this one to Casey Sunseri, as the game was tied at 3-3.
West Virginia was able to retake the lead in the seventh as Sam White got things going with an infield single before Marot singled to advance White to third. Perazza then came off the bench to hit, and he scored White on a sac-fly, giving WVU a 4-3 lead. WVU's offense added another run in the eighth, playing small ball. Kresser doubled to start the inning before King advanced him to third on a bunt. Then, Jace Rinehart came off the bench, as he, too laid down a bunt to score Kresser and pad the West Virginia lead at 5-3.
Freshman Mac Stiffler followed Kirn on the mound for the Mountaineers, getting one out, while Jack Kartsonas followed Stiffler.
Kirn finished the day going only 4.0 innings, walking three, giving up three runs on five hits while striking out only one. Stiffler got a walk and a strikeout in his 0.1 innings pitched, while Kartsonas pitched 2.1 scoreless innings, giving up three hits, and striking out three.
Cole Fehrman and Reese Bassinger followed for WVU, and they tried to continue WVU's success on the mound. Fehrman was successful in that venture, but Bassinger was not.
Bassinger retired two in a row to start the eighth, but then Lipscomb hit their third home run of the game as Damion Kenealy homered to cut WVU's lead to 5-4 before Bassinger ended the eighth with the lead.
Bassinger stayed on to pitch the ninth for WVU, giving up a single to start the inning, before that runner advanced to second on a bunt. Bassinger got the second out of the inning on a pop out, before getting a fly out to end the game and seal the win for the Mountaineers.
Bassinger totaled 2.0 innings, giving up one run on three hits while earning the save.
WVU finished the game with 14 hits, and Lipscomb had 11 hits on the afternoon. Kartsonas got credited with the win (1-0), while Bassinger earned his third save of the young season.
WVU and Lipscomb play a doubleheader on Sunday with the first game slated to start at 1:00 p.m.
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