West Point Thoroughbreds and Hall of Fame trainer Shug McGaughey finished second by a neck in last year’s Pegasus World Cup Turf with Integration. The connections are back this year with Cugino, the second choice on Saturday’s morning line at 7-to-2, with John Velazquez to get a leg up on the 5-year-old son of Twirling Candy.

Pegasus World Cup coverage will air live on NBC network channel and on Peacock from 4:30 to 6 ET. 

Cugino won the Red Smith Stakes (G2) in November at Aqueduct and may have run his best race yet when he rallied to finish second by three-quarters of a length in the Grade 3 Fort Lauderdale Stakes on December 20 over this course and distance at Gulfstream. The winner that day, Wolfie’s Dynaghost, set a North American record by completing 9 furlongs in a mind-boggling 1:43.42.

Shug told Daily Racing Form: “I’ve been around the track a long time. I’ve never seen anything that fast. The way the track was, it was hard to catch up.”

Cugino has been admirably consistent with 6 wins and 5 seconds from 14 career starts and earnings of $800,210.

McGaughey and West Point will team with Eclipse champ Flavien Prat earlier on the Pegasus Day card with recent stakes winner Ohana Honor in the $200,000 William L. McKnight Stakes (G3).

Prat guided Ohana Honor to a breakthrough win in the Knickerbocker Stakes on November 15 at Aqueduct.

The 6-year-old son of Honor Code is 5-to-2 on the morning line for the 12-furlong William L. McKnight, a race that West Point captured in 2012 and ’13 with the prolific turf star Twilight Eclipse.