Michael Grove is, like, the baddest man going in the Big 12 these days. Just mowing guys down at a prodigious rate and giving West Virginia’s baseball team a top-shelf starter late in the schedule, which has in turn bolstered the bullpen. Put together, he’s helped the Mountaineers appreciably so that they might survive and advance in the Big 12 tournament.

He lasted two batters and recorded but one out Wednesday … and the Mountaineers won.

Remember, the season changed when Grove relieved starter-now-reliever B.J. Myers with two outs and WVU trailing 7-2 in the first inning at Oklahoma. Grove allowed four hits and struck out 13 in 8.1 innings. The Mountaineers won, and they’ve now won 15 of 18.

Grove wrenched his knee this time and was relieved Wednesday by starter-now-reliever Ross Vance, who might have been needed as a starter in the tournament, and the crafty senior southpaw allowed one hit and struck out seven in 8.2 innings of scoreless relief.

The Mountaineers won, 6-0, and though they felt very good about their performance, consider Sooners manager Pete Hughes, who by now is fed up with WVU’s bully, to be duly impressed.

“First of all, that kid woke up this morning never thinking he was going to pitch. That was unbelievable. Even though I was on the other side, I still truly appreciate that kid’s effort because that is really hard to do. He was good mixing up his pitches and keeping the ball down in the zone, and it presented a problem for us.”

All in all, this was peak recent WVU, though, beyond the bullpen shenanigans.

The Mountaineers opened the scoring in the third, when a two-out walk was followed by two singles, and the RBI hit came from freshman second baseman Cole Austin. He’d been playing third before he left the lineup for a while and returned for the weekend series at Texas Tech. He was 3-for-5 with three runs in two starts there and 2-for-4 with the RBI Wednesday.

In the fourth, two one-out bunt singles and then a double-steal preceded Kyle Davis’ three-run home run, and would you look at this thing?

https://twitter.com/WVUBaseball/status/735492673142804480

Look at the back leg. He didn’t even get into it like he wanted to. “Honestly, once I hit it I was just trying to get it in the air, sacrifice situation,” he said. “I got a fastball away with two strikes and I got it in the air. I was like, ‘Okay, I did my job.’ Then, I saw the center fielder just stop running and I saw it land, and I was just like, ‘Wow, I mean, that’ll work.’”

A walk and a single followed, and Jackson Cramer drove in a run with a ground out for a 5-0 lead.

In the fifth, K.C. Huth tripled and then scored on a throwing error, and Vance then retired the final 11 batters of the game.

Tidy stuff, and now a 5 p.m. game Thursday against the winner of the game between top seed Texas Tech and No. 8 seed Kansas State.