Jayhawks Finish Off Wildcats; Win Sunflower Showdown

Following a tumultuous Friday evening featuring Jacob Frost striking out 10 Jayhawk hitters and Jackson Hauge’s heroics for the home team, the visiting Kansas State Wildcats looked to even up the Sunflower Showdown.  Head Coach Pete Hughes turned to southpaw Lincoln Sheffield after fellow lefty Frost had dazzled for six innings the night before.  

The turn from Frost to Sheffield has remained constant in 2025, though Dan Fitzgerald called an audible in handing the ball to Sophomore Cooper Moore.  Moore has battled injury, though the shift to a Saturday role is something KU fans can expect to get used to.  Fitzgerald believes moving Moore up a day now will make things easier on his staff when Kansas closes the season against BYU and West Virginia, series’ that begin on Thursday as opposed to the traditional Friday.

With a calmer energy in the air, both starters were able to work clean first innings, despite allowing base runners.  The feeling of calmness permeated each offense in the second, first personified through Sam Flores touching a ball over the right field fence to give Kansas State the early 1-0 lead.  Not to be outdone, the home Jayhawks scratched a run of their own across when Ian Francis plated Tommy Barth in the home half.

The Wildcats, in their road grays, responded with an RBI groundout from Seth Dardar and a second of the grounder variety off the bat of Keegan O’Connor netted K-State’s third run of the afternoon.  The Kansas State advantage didn’t last long as the home Jayhawks continued to play station to station.

In the home half of the third, Hauge singled home Ballinger, cutting the K-State lead to 3-2.  The Jayhawks grabbed hold of the contest when 4th inning run-scoring plays from Tommy Barth and Ian Francis drove in runs three and four for the home nine. 

The Jayhawks added to their run of consecutive-scoring innings in the fifth when Dariel Osoria drove in Ballinger and Michael Brooks brought Hauge home.  Offensively, KU’s Hauge, Derek Cerda and Sawyer Smith extended their on-base streaks to 26, 19 and 16, respectively. 

The offensive serpentine displayed by Kansas allowed Moore to settle in.  The Sophomore righty didn’t yield a base hit to the Wildcats in the 4th, 5th or 6th innings.  Moore handed the ball to closer Alex Breckheimer in the ninth, finishing the day with 8 strikeouts, giving up three runs on six hits across his eight innings of work.

“Going out there and trusting myself and just filling up the zone, I’m going to go seven every time”, Moore said of his confidence.  Confidence is a two way street though, “they really believe me and they really believe in my stuff”, Moore said of the KU coaching staff.  

Breckheimer, accepting his role as newly-minted closer, shut the door on the Wildcat comeback attempt, throwing 21 pitches to record three in-play outs to end the contest.  With the 6-3 victory, the Jayhawks clinched the series against rival Kansas State and celebrated their 30th win of the season.