No. 11 Red Raiders Continue Road Stretch at West Virginia

LUBBOCK, Texas – The No. 11 Texas Tech baseball team heads to Morgantown, W.Va., this weekend for its third conference road series, taking on West Virginia in a three-game set at Monongalia County Ballpark.

Friday's opener begins at 5:30 p.m. CT, Saturday's first pitch is slated for 3 p.m. CT and Sunday's finale will start at 12 p.m. CT. All three games will be streamed live for free on WVUsports.com/Watch, while fans can also watch the stream live via Roku and Apple TV by searching "West Virginia Mountaineers" channel. Fans can also listen to the action on the Texas Tech Sports Network on 97.3 FM, the 97.3 mobile app, TuneIn app and TexasTech.TV.

This weekend marks the midway point of the Big 12 schedule for the Red Raiders (22-9, 5-4) and the Mountaineers (20-12, 4-5), who are among several teams jockeying for position in the league standings. Tech enters the weekend in a three-way tie for third, a game and a half back of league-leading Baylor. West Virginia sits in seventh, a game back of Tech.

Friday's game will mark the 22nd all-time meeting between the two teams, with Tech holding an 11-10 edge in the overall series. In regular season contests, Tech holds an 11-7 advantage and has won seven of the last 10.

Tech has taken 2-of-3 games from the Mountaineers each of the last three seasons, including in its last visit to Morgantown in 2017. The Red Raiders swept a doubleheader with 1-0 and 4-3 victories before dropping the finale, 3-2. Tech is 4-5 all-time in Morgantown.

Last season, Tech battled back from a one-run loss in the series opener to claim the final two matchups, 4-1 and 8-5. Gabe Holt led Tech, hitting .500 in the series while Caleb Kilian earned gave up just two earned runs in 7.2 innings to get the win on Saturday.

The Red Raiders are coming off a series win over Kansas in Lubbock last weekend and a 10-5 victory over New Mexico State in Midland, Texas. The Tech lineup has been on a tear of late, with double-digit hits in six consecutive games for the first time since 2010. Junior Josh Jung has started heating up with home runs in each of the last two games.

Jung, along with freshman shortstop Dru Baker, were honored this week for their performance last week. Jung was named the Bragan Award Player of the week, while Baker returned from an injury to claim Big 12 Newcomer of the Week. The duo join four other Red Raiders who have taken home weekly awards this season.

West Virginia heads into the weekend after back-to-back Big 12 series wins and a midweek triumph at Maryland.

Head coach Tim Tadlock will make a slight change to the rotation this week as he hands the ball over to veteran left-hander Erikson Lanning on Friday, freshman star Micah Dallas on Saturday and reliable junior Caleb Kilian on Sunday. Lanning is back in the Friday night role for the fifth time this season, while Dallas and Kilian slide back a day. Dallas has been impressive since moving into the rotation, striking out 17 in 18.0 innings of work with a 2-0 mark.

West Virginia will turn to junior right-hander and reigning National Pitcher of the Week Alek Manoah on Friday, sophomore southpaw Jackson Wolf on Saturday and junior right-hander Kade Strowd for the finale. Manoah was honored after delivering 8.0 shutout innings in a win over No. 23 Oklahoma State last weekend.

The trip to Morgantown continues Tech's toughest road stretch of the season. The stretch contains 10-of-13 games away from home across five different cities outside of Lubbock. Morgantown will be the fourth city on the tour with a trip to Durham, N.C. on Tuesday to finish it out. The Red Raiders have gone 6-3 during the stretch with four games to go.

Tech has been a force offensively this season, ranking in the top 10 nationally in several categories, including scoring (10), batting (10), base on balls (10) and on base percentage (8). Individually, Dylan Neuse is third in the nation in triples with five.

Texas Tech settled in as high as No. 11 in the rankings for the second straight week. After beginning the season as high as No. 3 in the preseason rankings, Tech has been in the top 15 by at least one poll every week this season.

Tech remains one of the top RPI teams in the country, sitting at No. 9 heading to Morgantown. Tech's strength of schedule is currently No. 17 with an upcoming Big 12 series against ranked Baylor (No. 17).

Following the weekend series, Texas Tech will remain in the Eastern Time zone and head to Durham, N.C., for a 5 p.m. CT Tuesday midweek game against Duke at the Durham Bulls Athletic Park. The matchup will be a rematch of the 2018 Lubbock Super Regional, where Tech defeated the Blue Devils in three games to advance to the 2018 College World Series for the third time in five years.

No. 11 Red Raiders Continue Road Stretch at West Virginia

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Players Mentioned

Dru Baker

Micah Dallas

Gabe Holt

Josh Jung

Caleb Kilian

Erikson Lanning

Dylan Neuse

Texas Tech University Athletics