Playing with a Chip on Their Shoulder
Feb 27, 2025 | Baseball, Sports Extra
By: D. Scott Fritchen
Kansas State head coach Pete Hughes, who has 28 years of experience in college baseball, would like to say he's been here before. But he hasn't. Never before have his teams defeated three different top-25 opponents in a row. But that changed as the Wildcats made a splash by defeating three teams featured in the national polls — No. 5 Arkansas (D1Baseball), No. 25 Michigan (Baseball America) and No. 22 TCU (D1Baseball) this past weekend.
On Sunday, K-State scored nine runs in a three-inning span, backing Lincoln Sheffield's quality start and clinching the Amegy Bank College Baseball Series title with a 10-2 win over the Horned Frogs at Globe Life Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
Sheffield was named Big 12 Co-Newcomer of the Week for his efforts.
Now K-State, 4-4, armed with perhaps the toughest non-conference schedule in the country, prepares to face No. 2 LSU, Sam Houston State and Nebraska at the Frisco Classic in Frisco, Texas. The Wildcats meet the Tigers for a 2 p.m. first pitch on Friday.
"Obviously, LSU is a storied program," Hughes says. "It's got some tradition, some history, and again, if Kansas State baseball wants to go where we want to go and where we'll get to eventually, we have to beat the Arkansas' of the world and the LSU's of the world."
Hughes spoke with K-State Sports Extra's D. Scott Fritchen about the Wildcats' magical three-game stretch, their standout performers, and the team's belief and goals as the Wildcats move forward with their season:
D. Scott Fritchen: What was your feeling, your immediate thoughts, as your guys make the final out to beat No. 22 TCU and capture the Amegy Bank College Baseball Series at Globe Life Stadium in Arlington, Texas?
Pete Hughes: We're finally starting to play clean baseball. This is the result of clean baseball. Like I told our guys, we are certainly talented enough to play at the highest level of college baseball and be successful, but we can't beat anyone if we don't make routine plays and then walk and hit people. There are three things that will allow us to win games and it's very simple: 1) Don't walk anybody, 2) throw strikes, 3) make the routine play, not the exceptional one and don't make any errors. We run hard 90s. That is, we sprint hard from home to first no matter what the play is and that's just a way of saying we play hard, energetic baseball. Throw strikes, don't make any errors and play hard. That's the formula for winning. We did that for three straight days, and the result was a positive result. That was good to reinforce my message to our team.
Fritchen: Was this as memorable of a three-game stretch as you can remember in a regular season?
Hughes: Hasn't happened at K-State. Very rarely can you beat — I don't think I've done that in my career, beaten three top-25 teams in a row in three different days. I think that's a first. But we treated it like a Regional. You're in a four-team tournament, and we treated it like a Regional. You've got to win Game 1, and then you put yourself in a great situation by winning Game 1. You're in an even better situation by winning Game 2. You come up on the third day, and here it is, you show up on the third day of the Regional, and that means you need to win the Regional. That was good. I talked in those terms with our team all weekend, and that's how we treated it. I want it to be second nature when the time comes again.
Fritchen: You've coached a lot of baseball, 28 years, and given the recent competition level, is this the fastest you've seen a team really put it together to start a season?
Hughes: It might be the worst start to a season I've had in 28 years. I don't even say that sarcastically because we couldn't have played any worse at the start in going 1-4, and I felt bad for our guys because that's not the result we wanted. It was work ethic and command. I'm proud of our guys believing in their skill set in our team. No one faltered in our start. We played poorly. It was really hard to keep doing that because we're really talented, but I'm proud of our team for getting on the other side of that quickly, and making the adjustments they needed to make to perform, and they got the results this weekend. You look at our season, and we played poorly the first weekend and played good the second weekend. We don't overreact either way. That's our mindset. I'm really happy our guys got to see what the results look like when you do the little things correctly. Just do the little things correctly and you're going to get the result that you want.
Fritchen: You had 20 newcomers make their K-State debut on Opening Weekend. Describe the togetherness that you've already witnessed among this team.
Hughes: We have an exceptional group of core guys who returned. It's small. It's Ty Ruhl, Cayden Phillips, David Bishop, J.J. Slack, Kyan Lodice. These guys know what our culture is, and they demand it from anyone who walks into that clubhouse door, any new face, they set the tone for what the K-State baseball standards are and they don't compromise. I don't give that message. Those guys do that in the clubhouse. The clubhouse runs itself because of those guys, and because of that, we have a strong, strong culture and it's the foundation of our program. Those core guys, those returners will never let another standard walk through that clubhouse, and that's addressed on Day 1. It's a healthy team atmosphere right now. Everyone is locked in on winning. It's a pretty selfless group. Whether they're playing or not, it's about the W for K-State that day. Whatever role they're playing, they all have the same goal and the same interest and that's winning for Kansas State. Pretty good.
Fritchen: There has to be a strong belief among this team as well. How would you describe the belief that this team is playing with?
Hughes: These guys are locked in. They want to reach their potential every day, and we're certainly goal oriented. No one has backed off from the toughest non-conference schedule in the country. They've attacked it. We talk about it all the time, they changed a pad on our infield wall, a new pad on our rightfield wall to add our Super Regional appearance from last year. We want them to change the damn pads on our outfield wall every fall. That's what we showed up here for. I don't want to look at the same damn pad next fall. I want them to keep changing them. That's the belief our guys have, that's the mindset, and that's a winning mindset that we brought when we all signed up to play baseball at Kansas State.
Fritchen: What was the difference between the loss at No. 6 North Carolina and then turning around to beat No. 5 Arkansas? What changed between those two games?
Hughes: We made routine plays, honestly. We didn't make routine plays against Carolina. Routine plays. Can't give good teams five or six outs an inning. But we battled like crazy at Carolina. It was back and forth. They had one of the best closers in the country, and we were really productive against that guy. I kept telling them, we didn't get the result, but you guys are so close to playing clean baseball and getting the win we all deserve. Nothing really changed. Maybe it took a little bit to get settled in. There were a lot of new guys out there playing at this level for the first time. There's a comfort zone that allows kids to perform, and there's also some growing pains before you get there. It looks like we got it out of our system. That was the case from the first four games.
Fritchen: What statistics really jump off the page in your opinion?
Hughes: The only thing I care about is not walking anybody, and I thought we were really good this past weekend. We played error-free baseball for our last three games in that environment. Against Arkansas, the whole lower bowl of that stadium was filled with red. I'm proud of our guys, though, they embrace that atmosphere and feed off it. It's the same thing we did last year in the Regionals. They fed off the energy, even though it was coming out of red sweatshirts, nevertheless it was energy we were feeding off of. It was pretty cool. Every inning is a high-leverage situation. To play error-free leads to winning baseball. We got some guys that statistically aren't going to look like they look right now. They're really good players, and when the year is over, the numbers are going to be in their favor.
We have some guys playing some great baseball. Maximus Martin, Dee Kennedy is playing at a high level. Seth Dardar, is a great story, a graduate from Columbia who has hardly played baseball, and now he's healthy and as a grad transfer is really playing his first season of baseball and he's playing great. Donte Lewis, a freshman, was awesome, four innings and no hits. He was dynamic the other day against Michigan. He was dominant. Lincoln Sheffield, that was as efficient of a start as you can have in baseball against TCU. He worked fast, filled up the zone, three pitches for strikes, competes like crazy. He's fun to watch. Everything is kind of predicated off of good starting pitching. Jacob Frost was dominant against Arkansas. That's got to be one of the best offensive lineups in the country, and when the year is over, you'll see that. He handled the big moment, the big stage. He commanded the zone, competed, went after people. Those are all good things.
I think our guys play with the chip on their shoulder, too. I think we were the afterthought in that tournament. We're a Super Regional team, and our guys are pretty motivated by that stuff. So do I. Everybody talks about how tough our schedule is. Of all the teams we've played in the first 10 days, we finished higher nationally in the country except for one, Carolina, who went to Omaha. We finished ahead of Arkansas, LSU, Nebraska, Sam Houston State, Coastal Carolina, Michigan and TCU. So why is K-State still an afterthought? That's kind of the battle we fight. I resent it. It motivates me. Our players resent it. It motivates them. We need to keep doing our thing, and sooner or later we'll get our creditability. It doesn't help starting out 1-4 and I get that, but we're a good team and we're not going to waver.
Fritchen: I wanted to go back to Lincoln Sheffield, who was named Big 12 Co-Newcomer of the Week. Who does he remind you of?
Hughes: He reminds me of Jordan Wicks. He's a pretty good player comparison in this program. Physically, he looks like him in a uniform. He pitches similar. He pitches a plus-changeup. Jordan grew into having more velocity right now than Lincoln, but Lincoln has plenty of velocity. He's 88 to 91. His slider was outstanding. He has three things that make him really good despite his stuff. His stuff, you have to have stuff or you can't pitch in the Power 4. He has command of three pitches, he has a tempo in which he works, he works really fast and keeps your defense in it, and it doesn't allow the batter to make adjustments pitch to pitch because he works so fast, but the best thing he brings is he's the ultimate competitor. It's a bulldog mentality, man, just like Wicks, a bulldog mentality, and that just sheds confidence on everybody in your lineup, because he has seven guys behind him looking at him and a catcher looking straight at him, and that just gives everybody confidence when he's on the mound. He's got great confidence, command and great tempo every time he takes the mound.
Fritchen: You said after beating TCU that it was a good three days and a long year ahead to improve in a lot of areas. What have you identified as areas in which this team can improve?
Hughes: They have to prove to me that they can play at a high level consistently. We played different in the first weekend. We make two or three little mistakes in a game, and that's not our standard. We have a lot of kids who are learning the game, and we can't be learning the game in game. We have to clean some things up fundamentally. Our bunting game I don't like, and I don't love our running game right now. Those are the areas where you win one-run games or lose one-run games. I don't love our pitchers' defense right now. Just little fundamental baseball we have to clean up. It's little, but it means everything. It's the difference between one-run games and we'll play in our share of those.
Fritchen: What are your thoughts on No. 2 LSU as you prepare to face them on Friday?
Hughes: Obviously, it's a storied program. My second son, Hal, played there for three years and was starting shortstop. It's got some tradition, some history, and again, if Kansas State baseball wants to go where we want to go and where we'll get to eventually, we have to beat the Arkansas' of the world and the LSU's of the world. When you look at these two tournaments, both tournaments have us matched up against SEC opponents on the first night of the tournament, meaning you get their first pitcher. So that's a daunting challenge for our guys, so we're going to see Arkansas No. 1, which we did — and the kid is going to be in the Big Leagues — and we're going to see LSU's No. 1 on Friday, who will be in the Big Leagues. We'll just do our thing. We wouldn't want it any other way. We have to beat really good arms. It's going to make us so much better when we come to Big 12 play, and we'll be prepared for anything and any arm in any situation because of how we scheduled. LSU is just another team for us to help us keep building that resume. Certainly, a storied program, super talented roster, and they have themselves a really good team. It'll be a good challenge for our guys but certainly one I don't think we're not capable of having success against and playing well against.
Kansas State head coach Pete Hughes, who has 28 years of experience in college baseball, would like to say he's been here before. But he hasn't. Never before have his teams defeated three different top-25 opponents in a row. But that changed as the Wildcats made a splash by defeating three teams featured in the national polls — No. 5 Arkansas (D1Baseball), No. 25 Michigan (Baseball America) and No. 22 TCU (D1Baseball) this past weekend.
On Sunday, K-State scored nine runs in a three-inning span, backing Lincoln Sheffield's quality start and clinching the Amegy Bank College Baseball Series title with a 10-2 win over the Horned Frogs at Globe Life Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
Sheffield was named Big 12 Co-Newcomer of the Week for his efforts.
Now K-State, 4-4, armed with perhaps the toughest non-conference schedule in the country, prepares to face No. 2 LSU, Sam Houston State and Nebraska at the Frisco Classic in Frisco, Texas. The Wildcats meet the Tigers for a 2 p.m. first pitch on Friday.
"Obviously, LSU is a storied program," Hughes says. "It's got some tradition, some history, and again, if Kansas State baseball wants to go where we want to go and where we'll get to eventually, we have to beat the Arkansas' of the world and the LSU's of the world."
Hughes spoke with K-State Sports Extra's D. Scott Fritchen about the Wildcats' magical three-game stretch, their standout performers, and the team's belief and goals as the Wildcats move forward with their season:
D. Scott Fritchen: What was your feeling, your immediate thoughts, as your guys make the final out to beat No. 22 TCU and capture the Amegy Bank College Baseball Series at Globe Life Stadium in Arlington, Texas?
Pete Hughes: We're finally starting to play clean baseball. This is the result of clean baseball. Like I told our guys, we are certainly talented enough to play at the highest level of college baseball and be successful, but we can't beat anyone if we don't make routine plays and then walk and hit people. There are three things that will allow us to win games and it's very simple: 1) Don't walk anybody, 2) throw strikes, 3) make the routine play, not the exceptional one and don't make any errors. We run hard 90s. That is, we sprint hard from home to first no matter what the play is and that's just a way of saying we play hard, energetic baseball. Throw strikes, don't make any errors and play hard. That's the formula for winning. We did that for three straight days, and the result was a positive result. That was good to reinforce my message to our team.
Fritchen: Was this as memorable of a three-game stretch as you can remember in a regular season?
Hughes: Hasn't happened at K-State. Very rarely can you beat — I don't think I've done that in my career, beaten three top-25 teams in a row in three different days. I think that's a first. But we treated it like a Regional. You're in a four-team tournament, and we treated it like a Regional. You've got to win Game 1, and then you put yourself in a great situation by winning Game 1. You're in an even better situation by winning Game 2. You come up on the third day, and here it is, you show up on the third day of the Regional, and that means you need to win the Regional. That was good. I talked in those terms with our team all weekend, and that's how we treated it. I want it to be second nature when the time comes again.
Fritchen: You've coached a lot of baseball, 28 years, and given the recent competition level, is this the fastest you've seen a team really put it together to start a season?
Hughes: It might be the worst start to a season I've had in 28 years. I don't even say that sarcastically because we couldn't have played any worse at the start in going 1-4, and I felt bad for our guys because that's not the result we wanted. It was work ethic and command. I'm proud of our guys believing in their skill set in our team. No one faltered in our start. We played poorly. It was really hard to keep doing that because we're really talented, but I'm proud of our team for getting on the other side of that quickly, and making the adjustments they needed to make to perform, and they got the results this weekend. You look at our season, and we played poorly the first weekend and played good the second weekend. We don't overreact either way. That's our mindset. I'm really happy our guys got to see what the results look like when you do the little things correctly. Just do the little things correctly and you're going to get the result that you want.
Fritchen: You had 20 newcomers make their K-State debut on Opening Weekend. Describe the togetherness that you've already witnessed among this team.
Hughes: We have an exceptional group of core guys who returned. It's small. It's Ty Ruhl, Cayden Phillips, David Bishop, J.J. Slack, Kyan Lodice. These guys know what our culture is, and they demand it from anyone who walks into that clubhouse door, any new face, they set the tone for what the K-State baseball standards are and they don't compromise. I don't give that message. Those guys do that in the clubhouse. The clubhouse runs itself because of those guys, and because of that, we have a strong, strong culture and it's the foundation of our program. Those core guys, those returners will never let another standard walk through that clubhouse, and that's addressed on Day 1. It's a healthy team atmosphere right now. Everyone is locked in on winning. It's a pretty selfless group. Whether they're playing or not, it's about the W for K-State that day. Whatever role they're playing, they all have the same goal and the same interest and that's winning for Kansas State. Pretty good.
Fritchen: There has to be a strong belief among this team as well. How would you describe the belief that this team is playing with?
Hughes: These guys are locked in. They want to reach their potential every day, and we're certainly goal oriented. No one has backed off from the toughest non-conference schedule in the country. They've attacked it. We talk about it all the time, they changed a pad on our infield wall, a new pad on our rightfield wall to add our Super Regional appearance from last year. We want them to change the damn pads on our outfield wall every fall. That's what we showed up here for. I don't want to look at the same damn pad next fall. I want them to keep changing them. That's the belief our guys have, that's the mindset, and that's a winning mindset that we brought when we all signed up to play baseball at Kansas State.
Fritchen: What was the difference between the loss at No. 6 North Carolina and then turning around to beat No. 5 Arkansas? What changed between those two games?
Hughes: We made routine plays, honestly. We didn't make routine plays against Carolina. Routine plays. Can't give good teams five or six outs an inning. But we battled like crazy at Carolina. It was back and forth. They had one of the best closers in the country, and we were really productive against that guy. I kept telling them, we didn't get the result, but you guys are so close to playing clean baseball and getting the win we all deserve. Nothing really changed. Maybe it took a little bit to get settled in. There were a lot of new guys out there playing at this level for the first time. There's a comfort zone that allows kids to perform, and there's also some growing pains before you get there. It looks like we got it out of our system. That was the case from the first four games.
Fritchen: What statistics really jump off the page in your opinion?
Hughes: The only thing I care about is not walking anybody, and I thought we were really good this past weekend. We played error-free baseball for our last three games in that environment. Against Arkansas, the whole lower bowl of that stadium was filled with red. I'm proud of our guys, though, they embrace that atmosphere and feed off it. It's the same thing we did last year in the Regionals. They fed off the energy, even though it was coming out of red sweatshirts, nevertheless it was energy we were feeding off of. It was pretty cool. Every inning is a high-leverage situation. To play error-free leads to winning baseball. We got some guys that statistically aren't going to look like they look right now. They're really good players, and when the year is over, the numbers are going to be in their favor.
We have some guys playing some great baseball. Maximus Martin, Dee Kennedy is playing at a high level. Seth Dardar, is a great story, a graduate from Columbia who has hardly played baseball, and now he's healthy and as a grad transfer is really playing his first season of baseball and he's playing great. Donte Lewis, a freshman, was awesome, four innings and no hits. He was dynamic the other day against Michigan. He was dominant. Lincoln Sheffield, that was as efficient of a start as you can have in baseball against TCU. He worked fast, filled up the zone, three pitches for strikes, competes like crazy. He's fun to watch. Everything is kind of predicated off of good starting pitching. Jacob Frost was dominant against Arkansas. That's got to be one of the best offensive lineups in the country, and when the year is over, you'll see that. He handled the big moment, the big stage. He commanded the zone, competed, went after people. Those are all good things.
I think our guys play with the chip on their shoulder, too. I think we were the afterthought in that tournament. We're a Super Regional team, and our guys are pretty motivated by that stuff. So do I. Everybody talks about how tough our schedule is. Of all the teams we've played in the first 10 days, we finished higher nationally in the country except for one, Carolina, who went to Omaha. We finished ahead of Arkansas, LSU, Nebraska, Sam Houston State, Coastal Carolina, Michigan and TCU. So why is K-State still an afterthought? That's kind of the battle we fight. I resent it. It motivates me. Our players resent it. It motivates them. We need to keep doing our thing, and sooner or later we'll get our creditability. It doesn't help starting out 1-4 and I get that, but we're a good team and we're not going to waver.
Fritchen: I wanted to go back to Lincoln Sheffield, who was named Big 12 Co-Newcomer of the Week. Who does he remind you of?
Hughes: He reminds me of Jordan Wicks. He's a pretty good player comparison in this program. Physically, he looks like him in a uniform. He pitches similar. He pitches a plus-changeup. Jordan grew into having more velocity right now than Lincoln, but Lincoln has plenty of velocity. He's 88 to 91. His slider was outstanding. He has three things that make him really good despite his stuff. His stuff, you have to have stuff or you can't pitch in the Power 4. He has command of three pitches, he has a tempo in which he works, he works really fast and keeps your defense in it, and it doesn't allow the batter to make adjustments pitch to pitch because he works so fast, but the best thing he brings is he's the ultimate competitor. It's a bulldog mentality, man, just like Wicks, a bulldog mentality, and that just sheds confidence on everybody in your lineup, because he has seven guys behind him looking at him and a catcher looking straight at him, and that just gives everybody confidence when he's on the mound. He's got great confidence, command and great tempo every time he takes the mound.
Fritchen: You said after beating TCU that it was a good three days and a long year ahead to improve in a lot of areas. What have you identified as areas in which this team can improve?
Hughes: They have to prove to me that they can play at a high level consistently. We played different in the first weekend. We make two or three little mistakes in a game, and that's not our standard. We have a lot of kids who are learning the game, and we can't be learning the game in game. We have to clean some things up fundamentally. Our bunting game I don't like, and I don't love our running game right now. Those are the areas where you win one-run games or lose one-run games. I don't love our pitchers' defense right now. Just little fundamental baseball we have to clean up. It's little, but it means everything. It's the difference between one-run games and we'll play in our share of those.
Fritchen: What are your thoughts on No. 2 LSU as you prepare to face them on Friday?
Hughes: Obviously, it's a storied program. My second son, Hal, played there for three years and was starting shortstop. It's got some tradition, some history, and again, if Kansas State baseball wants to go where we want to go and where we'll get to eventually, we have to beat the Arkansas' of the world and the LSU's of the world. When you look at these two tournaments, both tournaments have us matched up against SEC opponents on the first night of the tournament, meaning you get their first pitcher. So that's a daunting challenge for our guys, so we're going to see Arkansas No. 1, which we did — and the kid is going to be in the Big Leagues — and we're going to see LSU's No. 1 on Friday, who will be in the Big Leagues. We'll just do our thing. We wouldn't want it any other way. We have to beat really good arms. It's going to make us so much better when we come to Big 12 play, and we'll be prepared for anything and any arm in any situation because of how we scheduled. LSU is just another team for us to help us keep building that resume. Certainly, a storied program, super talented roster, and they have themselves a really good team. It'll be a good challenge for our guys but certainly one I don't think we're not capable of having success against and playing well against.
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