First pitch in the first game of the quite likely competitive and unpredictable Big 12 tournament is at 10 a.m. when No. 4 seed West Virginia takes on No. 5 seed Baylor. Both teams finished 12-12 in the regular season, and both teams were percolating before dropping two games in the final regular-season series. The Mountaineers earned fourth place and the No. 4 seed, which comes with the last at-bat that’s been a big deal for WVU all season, by winning two of three games against the Bears at the beginning of conference play.

Baylor’s pretty good, boasting the Big 12’s second-best team batting average and fourth-best team ERA as well as first-team all-conference players to prop up those rankings. The Mountaineers aren’t bad, though, and they rank third in batting average and ERA and had four players make the first or second team.

Freshman Isaiah Kerns will start for WVU today and top starter B.J. Myers will throw tomorrow, and this almost runs counter to manager Randy Mazey’s “win this game, no matter what” tournament philosophy. Myers could be pitching in an elimination game tomorrow instead of keeping his team out of one today, but there’s an explanation.

“If we didn’t feel good about playing next weekend, we’d attack this weekend another way,” Mazey said. “We feel good about playing next weekend, so that takes the pressure off this weekend.”

Next weekend is the beginning of the NCAA tournament and regional play, and starting Myers on Thursday ensures he’ll have a normal amount of rest, as opposed to too many days off before the regionals begin. The Mountaineers haven’t been to a regional since 1996, but Mazey believes his team will be invited during the selection show Monday — if they don’t earn the automatic bid that comes with winning the conference tournament.

“I feel pretty good about where we’re sitting right now,” he said. “You don’t ever know for sure, but we’re in the best conference in the country and we finished fourth. If you look around at all the other conferences — the Power 5 conferences — and at all the other teams that finished fourth in those leagues, you’d feel pretty good about those guys getting in.

“I think if you look at it objectively, you’ve got to like where we’re at right now. I don’t ever count on it until I see our name come off the board. I’ve been in that position when I’ve gathered a team for the selection show and you never hear your name, so I’ll believe it when I see it. But as we sit here right now, you have to feel good about where we’re at.”

What do you say we find out? The game is on Fox College Sports. You can watch live online here. You can listen live here. You can follow live stats here.