Two Tivy grads are in college baseball’s postseason this week

A pair of Kerrville natives and Tivy High School graduates are competing in college baseball’s postseason simultaneously this week — one at the Division I level, one at Division II.

Coleson Abel, a senior right-hander at UT Tyler, and Aiden Cline, a sophomore pitcher at Kansas, represent the Hill Country on opposite ends of the college baseball landscape as their respective teams chase national championships.

Abel and the Patriots

Abel has been one of UT Tyler’s most reliable arms all season, going 7-0 with a 2.32 ERA and 73 strikeouts in 54.1 innings across 19 appearances. The No. 5-seeded Patriots (48-12) open the NCAA Division II College World Series on Friday at 12:30 p.m. Central against No. 4 Central Missouri at the USA Baseball National Training Complex in Cary, North Carolina — the program’s second consecutive World Series appearance.

Abel played a pivotal role in getting them there. In Saturday night’s South Central Super Regional clincher against top-ranked Colorado Mesa, he threw 2.2 innings of relief with four strikeouts, helping strand seven runners and preserve an 8-5 victory. Colorado Mesa had been averaging more than 15 runs per game in the postseason.

UT Tyler lands in a bracket alongside No. 1 seed West Chester and No. 8 UIndy, putting the Patriots on a potential collision course with the tournament’s top overall seed if they advance. Standing in the way first is a Central Missouri program that has made 22 College World Series appearances, won national titles in 1994 and 2003, and lost in the championship game as recently as last season. The Mules have reached Cary three consecutive years and are led offensively by Chase Wilcox, who is batting .367 with a .989 OPS, five home runs and 43 RBI this season, according to the NCAA.

Cline and the Jayhawks

Cline has been limited by injuries this season but remains on the roster for what has been one of college baseball’s most surprising runs. The Kerrville native is a sophomore who arrived at Kansas via Midland College and is one of seven Texans on a roster built almost entirely around junior college transfers — 23 of the Jayhawks’ 34 players have junior college experience, a deliberate philosophy by head coach Dan Fitzgerald that ESPN has called “the merriest band of juco bandits in college baseball.”

The results have been historic. Kansas won its first regular-season conference championship since 1949 — only the fourth in school history — then added the Big 12 Tournament title with a 9-0 shutout of West Virginia. Fitzgerald, who took over a program that finished last in the Big 12 and has brought it to first place in four seasons, was named Big 12 Coach of the Year for the second consecutive season.

The Jayhawks earned the No. 15 national seed and are hosting an NCAA Regional for the first time in program history. Kansas opens Friday at noon CT against Northeastern at Hoglund Ballpark in Lawrence, where the program has expanded capacity from 2,500 to approximately 4,000 to handle postseason demand. Arkansas and Missouri State complete the four-team field.

Both Abel and Cline took the junior college route to their current programs — Abel pitching at Lubbock Christian and Lamar before landing at UT Tyler, Cline spending time at Midland College before Kansas — mirroring the grind-it-out identity of both teams this postseason.