KU baseball to conclude Big 12 regular season at BYU — with league title at stake
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Kansas lost three games to West Virginia by scores of 4-1, 5-2 and 13-2.
- Kansas enters the BYU series with a one-game lead in the Big 12.
- KU can clinch at least a share of the conference title with two wins in Provo.
In the dream scenario for the Kansas Jayhawks baseball team, KU would have won its next-to-last Big 12 regular-season series at home last weekend and clinched the program’s first conference title since 1949.
But clinching that first conference title in nearly 80 years — when the Jayhawks competed in the Big Seven — would have to wait. No. 9-ranked West Virginia, the second-place team in the league, swept No. 14 KU by scores of 4-1, 5-2 and 13-2 last Friday through Sunday at Hoglund Ballpark.
Thus, the Mountaineers stayed alive with KU (37-15, 20-7 Big 12), Arizona State and UCF in the chase for a league pennant.
The Jayhawks now enter a three-game season-ending series on Thursday-Saturday at BYU (13-14 Big 12) in Provo, Utah.
West Virginia, now just one game back of the Jayhawks at 19-8, will play host to TCU (16-11) in a similar three-game series. ASU at 17-10 will travel to Houston (6-21) for three games, while UCF (17-10) will entertain Kansas State (10-17) in Florida.
A KU victory in Thursday’s game (7 p.m. Central Time) at Miller Park, combined with a WVU loss, would assure the Jayhawks a tie for the conference crown. ASU and UCF would be eliminated if KU wins Thursday.
Regardless of other teams’ results, Kansas can clinch at least a share of the league title with two victories this week/weekend — and KU would win the title outright with three wins.
“I think every coach in the country would take a one-game lead with three to play in their respective league,” fourth-year KU coach Dan Fitzgerald said. “I mean, it’s the exact spot you want to be in.”
Those three losses to WVU last weekend were uncharacteristic of a KU team that has now won 10 of its last 14 games, 21 of its last 26 and 27 of its most recent 34.
“Part of being in the Big 12 is knowing that if you have a good regular season you get to play with house money in the postseason, because you’ve earned your way there,” Fitzgerald said. “And I think there are markers, whether it’s 18 wins or 19 wins or 17 wins — or in some cases, a 15-15 Big 12 team with a great RPI can get in, or a 14-16 team.
“Our goal was never, ‘We’re going to win X amount of games or win the Big 12 by X amount of games.’ It was always, ‘We want to play our best baseball at the end of the season.’ And I mean the end of the season, not the end of the regular season. I’m talking as late as we can possibly play, we want to be playing our best baseball.”
Fitzgerald said there’s no lingering disappointment following last weekend’s three losses, just excitement as his team attempts to claim the league title ahead of the postseason Big 12 tourney and NCAAs.
“They’ve responded great,” Fitzgerald said of his players. “I met with some, jumped on the phone with some guys on Sunday, and then had some meetings yesterday (Monday). And it was business as usual.
“We addressed some things right after the game (Sunday). We’ve gotten a lot of work done at practice. There’s great energy. You’d have no idea whether we had won or lost last weekend by our practice today (Tuesday).”
The Jayhawks have matched their program record of 20 wins in conference play, a mark first attained in 2025. Kansas is the first Big 12 team with 20 conference wins in back-to-back seasons since Nebraska in 2000 and 2001.
Before last weekend’s series loss to West Virginia, KU had won seven consecutive Big 12 series for the first time in program history. Entering the final weekend of the regular season, KU has the most wins of any program in the Big 12.
KU’s combined 37 wins in back-to-back seasons also marks the second time the Jayhawks have reached that height. The first was in 1993-94. And 18 of those 37 wins came on the road — tied for fifth most in the country over that span.
Meanwhile, BYU (26-25, 13-14 Big 12) has won two of its last three games, including a 12-3 decision against Texas Tech last weekend and a 13-3 run-rule victory at home against Utah Valley on Tuesday.
KU, which will send Dominic Voegele (5-3, 6.35 ERA) to the mound Thursday against BYU’s Waylane Crane (2-4, 5.40), leads the two schools’ all-time series 11-7. And KU has won five of the last six in this series after sweeping BYU in Provo two seasons ago and winning two out of three at Hoglund Ballpark last year.
This week’s games will be contested at 7 p.m. Thursday, 7 p.m. Friday and 2 p.m. Saturday. For TV and streaming, the games will air on ESPN+. Fans can also listen on KLWN (101.7 FM/1320 AM) and the Jayhawk Sports Network on KUAthletics.com and the Kansas Jayhawks app.
Following this series, Kansas will compete in the Big 12 tournament next week in Surprise, Arizona. KU has earned a double-bye and will play its first league-tourney game on Thursday, May 21.
