A few more team achievements make the list this week, along with some notable strengths and postseason honors, as well.
All of that, and more, will be celebrated in this week’s episode of Monday Morning Wheaties.
You’ve seen the tomahawks on the back of the Florida State helmets, the buckeye tree leaves on the Ohio State helmets and the paw prints on the back of the Clemson helmets.
Each Monday, we take one last look back at the week that was and hand out different amounts of the iconic breakfast cereal to the Jayhawks’ top performers.
So, be sure to come get your Monday Morning Wheaties and feel free to hit up the comments section — subscribers only for now — with any players you feel we might’ve missed.
Picture on the box
• KU pitcher Dominic Voegele – The freshman righty from Columbia, Illinois, delivered one of his best outings of the year in KU’s 4-0, Game 2 win at Kansas State over the weekend. He threw six strong innings and allowed only four hits while strik-ing out five and walking one. Voegele now has eight quality starts and seven wins this season. The shutout was the first of the season for the Jayhawks, who improved their record to 27-17 overall and 13-11 in Big 12 play. The 13 conference wins are the most by the program since it won 15 during the 2014 season. KU will play at Omaha on Tuesday and then will close the regular season with two conference series on back-to-back weekends, May 10-12 against Houston at home and May 16-18 at Texas.
A full bowl
• KU men’s golf team – The Kansas men’s golf team was se-lected to its eighth-straight NCAA Regional appearance on Wednesday. Head Coach Jamie Bermel and the Jayhawks will head to California for the Rancho Santa Fe Regional as the No. 11 seed, beginning May 13 and going through May 15. The selection marks the eighth straight regional appearance for the Jayhawks, which is tied for the longest streak of con-secutive regional appearances in program history, matching a stretch from 1989 to 96 and from 1998 to 2005. The Jayhawks were led this season by sophomore Will King and senior Cecil Belisle, who each enter postseason play with a scoring average below 72, with King at 71.88 and Belisle at 71.94. The KU women are competing at regionals this week — Monday through Wednesday — in Cle Elum, Washington, so keep an eye out for more from that.
• KU tennis freshman Kyoka Kubo – Kubo was named to the Big 12 Conference All-Freshman team, the conference announced on Thursday, following an outstanding debut sea-son for the Jayhawks. Kubo, of Yokohama, Japan, compiled an overall record of 18-4 in singles play this season, including a perfect 13-0 on court four. Kubo finished 8-4 in Big 12 Con-ference singles play and 10-9 overall in doubles play. Kubo becomes the third-straight Jayhawk to be named to the Big 12 All-Freshman, after Heike Janse van Vuuren was named to the team in 2023 and Maria Titova in 2022. Speaking of van Vuuren, she recently was selected to participate in the 2024 Billie Jean King Cup, in which she will represent her home country of South Africa.
Nighttime snack
• KU outfielder John Nett – One week after watching team-mate Michael Brooks run his hitting streak to season-best 18 games, the senior transfer from St. Cloud State pushed his streak to a team-high 20 games. The streak was snapped in KU’s Game 2 win over Kansas State, when Nett went 0-for-4 with two strikeouts and an RBI in the 4-0 victory. Nett was 3-for-13 in the series and is now hitting .358 this season, which leads the Jayhawks.
• KU Softball Team – It wasn’t the best end to the season for the KU softball program — KU dropped its last 10 games of the regular season, with six but the Jayhawks did enough to get into the postseason, earning the No. 7 seed at this week’s Big 12 tournament in Oklahoma City. Jennifer McFalls’ squad, which finished the regular season 27-24-1 overall and 11-16 in Big 12 play, will take on 10th-seeded Houston at 5 p.m. Wednesday at USA Hall of Fame Stadium. The Jayhawks swept Houston earlier this season. The winner will face No. 2 seed Oklahoma at 1:30 p.m. Thursday in the quarterfinal round.
Drink the milk
• KU Rowing – For the third time in the past four seasons, the KU rowing team topped Kansas State to claim the Sunflower Showdown trophy, this time with the Jayhawks dominating the Wildcats, 17-5, on Saturday morning at Wyandotte County Lake in Kansas City, Kansas. KU won four of the six races on the day. Among the Jayhawks wins were the two highest-scoring races, the 1st Varsity 8 and the 2nd Varsity 8. KU also won the 2nd Varsity 4 and the 3rd Varsity 4. In case you missed them last week, here are a couple of Wave the Wheat features on KU rowers Katia Ustiuzhanina and Melia Martin.
— For tickets to all KU athletic events, visit kutickets.com
