Morgantown, WV – The No. 24 West Virginia Mountaineers (33-4, 12-3) hit three home runs, while junior starting pitcher Gavin Van Kempen and senior reliever Reese Bassinger combined to throw eight innings and seven strikeouts and junior closer Carson Estridge shut the door to move past the Cincinnati Bearcats (21-17, 8-9) Friday night 6-4.

West Virginia captured an early lead in the bottom of the first inning. With two outs on the board, senior Kyle West hit a high chopper to second for a single and a pair of wild pitches moved him to third before senior Jace Rinehart hit a high fly ball to first, but senior Tommy O’Connor drifted into foul territory, misjudging the ball and it landed in play for an RBI single and a 1-0 lead.

Sophomore Jack Natili tied the game for the Bearcats in the fourth with a leadoff home run.

In the bottom of the frame, Rinehart and junior Sam White began the inning with consecutive singles. Sophomore Spencer Barnett advanced the Mountaineer runners with a bunt before redshirt Chase Swain hit a shallow fly ball to left field, and Rinehart raced home and knocked the ball out of the glove of Natili for a 2-1 lead.

Senior Logan Sauve extended the Mountaineer lead in the fifth, driving the 1-2 pitch well over the left-centerfield wall for a 3-1 advantage.

In the sixth, Rinehart lifted the first pitch of the inning for a leadoff home run. Then, after White reached down and singled through the right side, senior Grant Hussey blasted a two-out two run home run to extend the Mountaineer lead, 6-1.

Cincinnati cut the WVU lead to four in the seventh. Senior Lauden Brooks ripped a leadoff double to right-center, redshirt senior Kerrington Cross worked a walk, a grounder advanced the Bearcat runners before senior Donovan Ford hit the sacrifice fly to right field.

The Bearcats put a run on the board in the ninth after reliever Reese Bassinger beaned Brooks and Cross tripled to right-centerfield. WVU head coach Steve Sabins called in junior closer Carson Estridge to the mound.

Cincinnati added another run with a sacrifice ground ball, but Estridge collected his second save of the season after lining out Ford and striking out Natili for the 6-4 decision.

West Virginia will look for the series sweep Saturday afternoon. The first pitch is set for 2:00 p.m. EST and the action will stream on ESPN+.

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VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — A man accused of sex trafficking a 15-year-old girl at the Oceanfront in Virginia Beach has been arrested and charged with several crimes.

Johnny Banks, 30, was arrested and remains in jail, accused of sex trafficking the girl and several other related charges, according to federal prosecutors.

In July 2024, Virginia Beach police were notified that the missing teen from Charlotte, N.C. was being held against her will and forced to “sell her body.”

Authorities say she was advertised online and taken to hotels at the Oceanfront and in Suffolk.

After the arrest, prosecutors allege that Banks was heard on a jail call saying the police messed up “my pimpn.”

The indictment alleges that Banks texted the girl, saying, “lol [JANE DOE] if u think u bouta play with me think again” and then texted “I’ll really out smart u and have u floating in a creek.”

The victim reported that Banks assaulted her, strangled her, and threatened to kill her.

Last summer, WTKR interviewed another survivor who said she was also trafficked at the Oceanfront.

“I ended up falling asleep,” the survivor recounted. “I got woke up to a 9-millimeter being pointed on me and her (trafficker) basically telling me you need to get up and you need to take a shower and you need to put some makeup on you’re going to work.”

Samaritan House, a nonprofit that provides support to survivors, says they are the leading resource for housing and services for victims of human trafficking in Southeast Virginia.

They report that 26% of victims are minors and that Virginia ranks 15th in the U.S. for reported cases of human trafficking.

Meredith Williams, Samaritan House Crisis Services supervisor, said tourist areas can attract these kinds of crimes.

Williams emphasizes the need for vigilance, urging people to report any suspicious activity to authorities.

The WTKR News 3 Investigative Team remains committed to exposing the issue of human sex trafficking and raising awareness to help protect the most vulnerable in the community.

We reached out to the lawyer representing Banks and she said she couldn’t comment on the case.

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Virginia’s state flag has been banned for a Texas school district, the Lamar Consolidated Independent School District (Lamar CISD), over nudity concerns

Virginia’s state flag has been banned for some students in a Texas school district, the Lamar Consolidated Independent School District (Lamar CISD), over nudity concerns, Texas Freedom to Read Project co-director Anne Russey told Axios. The Old Dominion State’s flag features a depiction of Virtus with an exposed breast.

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The Lamar CISD, about 30 minutes from Houston, removed a section about Virginia from its online learning platform, Pebble Go Next, used by 3rd-5th graders, Russey added.

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According to the Texas Freedom to Read Project, LCISD’s school board voted 5-1 to update its EFB Local Library Materials policy. “They made changes to the selection criteria, which they claimed were necessary to comply with the board’s interpretation of House Bill 900 (aka the READER Act). Among other things, the board policy added criteria that prohibit “frontal nudity” in any elementary school materials.”

However, Virginia officials have not commented on the omission yet. “The purpose of this policy is to ensure that the District provides a wide range of library materials for students and faculty that support student achievement and present varying levels of difficulty, diversity of appeal, and a variety of points of view,” LCISD said of the policy on their website.

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“Today, it’s the Virginia state flag. Tomorrow will it be books that contain historical photos or depictions of Holocaust survivors? Breast-feeding mothers? The Paper Bag Princess? Art history books that portray the statue of David or the Birth of Venus?” the Texas Freedom to Read Project further wrote in its blog.

Reacting to Lamar CISD’s reported decision, a Virginia local tweeted: “Virginia’s bare-breasted state flag, and a lesson about the Commonwealth of Virginia, has been banned for some students in a Texas school district. The reason: Our state flag violates the district’s frontal nudity image policy.”

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