West Virginia head coach Steve Sabins is ready for the challenge of No. 6 national seed LSU when the Mountaineers head to face the Tigers in the Super Regional round of the NCAA Tournament this weekend.
“This week is easier to go all in. We did do that. And it’s like anything, like you have to take aggressive and intelligent risks for you to win,” Sabins said.
West Virginia is preparing for their three-game series against the Tigers after the untraditional regional setting.
The Mountaineers had to survive what could’ve been a four or five-game weekend, and got through the weekend in only three games. Now, they are playing a maximum of three, allowing them to be more bold with their strategy in-game.
The biggest piece Sabins will have to figure out is his pitching staff.
Griffin Kirn and Jack Kartsonas will start games one and two, but what happens if the series reaches a pivotal game three on Monday? Could Robby Porco, once again, get the nod to start after not making it out of the second inning on Sunday.
The bigger question than a potential game three starter is when to use bullpen pieces and how long they will go for.
Reese Bassinger pitched every game this weekend, but was most effective in his outing on Friday while on full rest. Chase Meyer was about maxed out on Saturday, throwing roughly 50 pitches in relief. Carson Estridge had a couple of up-and-down days, and those have been the three main pieces in WVU’s bullpen up to this point.
The bigger issue for Sabins will revolve around what happens if he burns one of those three in a one-run game on Saturday and they’re unavailable the rest of the weekend, and then WVU loses that game he pitches in. It’s likely Sabins will almost have to nail every pitching decision given the current nature of WVU’s bullpen, and how the number of reliable arms isn’t what it was, even just a month ago.
“It’s definitely an interesting dynamic in that tournament format when you can survive to the next day. But this is essentially a three-game series. So this is how we’ve played the entire season,” Sabins said.
Sabins seems to have the mentality of going all in for the game at hand and worrying about everything else later. While that is okay for an elimination game, making the wrong gamble for Saturday’s game could derail the rest of the series for the Mountaineers.
“Score does dictate pitching decisions, of course, but if you have a chance to win the game in general, our philosophy has just been to be aggressive because we think our offense can score in bunches. And so you certainly don’t want to ever give the team the feeling that you’re going to play for tomorrow. So you have to keep going. You have to keep coming after people’s throats, and the other team needs to feel that heat, and then great things can happen, like it did in the regional,” Sabins said.
