Conference Races, Upsets & A Hit Streak Highlights…
The latest weekend of college baseball was, overall, light on upsets in the College Baseball 360 Top 50 Rankings. In fact, higher-ranked teams won 76% (29-9) of Sunday’s games involving the CB360 top-50. There were 40 series over the past few days involving CB360 top-50 teams, with 14 resulting in sweeps by the higher-ranked teams while 19 other favorites won their series 2-1.
The weekend saw a total of just six Top 50 series upsets, with Ole Miss pulling off the biggest series shocker-taking two of three games from #3 South Carolina.#21 Arkansas had the other big SEC upset by taking two of three from #4 Florida. (SEC Standings & potential Tournament seeding listed below.)
The rest of the series upsets came from the lower half of the Top 50. Wichita State took two of three from #36 Creighton, Missouri won its series at #44 Kansas State, and UNC Greensboro & Western Kentucky took series from #49 College of Charleston and #50 Florida Atlantic, respectively. #14 Fresno State didn’t lose its series, but did tie Louisiana Tech with two wins each.
Missouri started 2-9 in the Big-12, but has now won three straight series against Top 50 conference opponents Baylor, Texas A&M and K-State to move to 8-12 and seventh place in the Big 12.
Big 12 Standings
1. Texas A&M 15-6 2. Texas 17-7 3. Oklahoma St. 12-8 4. Oklahoma 13-9 5. Texas Tech & Baylor 9-12 7. Missouri 8-12 8. Kansas St. 9-14 9. Kansas 9-15 10. Nebraska 7-13
Chad Holbrook
This Tweet from South Carolina Associate Head Coach Chad Holbrook probably sums-up college baseball Sundays the best “Why do we talk about Sundays?? Its simple really-Teams that win on Sundays host regionals and play in Omaha. That’s what we are trying to do.”
Dallas Baptist dropped two out of three games in its series at #11 Texas A&M, but in winning the second game of the set the Patriots added to their quality win resume. DBU (32-15) has wins this season over Oklahoma State, TCU (2), Oklahoma, Rice, Texas Tech, and Texas A&M as the DI independent shoots for an at-large NCAA bid.
Speaking of TCU, the #15 Horned Frogs picked-up a Super Regional quality series win at#20 Oklahoma State. What’s probably most impressive about Jim Schlossnagle’s squad taking two of three in Stillwater is the fact that they did it without pitchers Matt Purke and Steven Maxwell. Purke (4-1, 1.55 ERA) is out with a shoulder injury, while Maxwell (5-0, 2.90 ERA) was sidelined due to a sore biceps. Purke threw on flat ground from 120 feet on Sunday. TCU hopes he will be available for the Mountain West Conference Tournament, which starts on May 24.
Princeton locked-up an NCAA bid by winning the Ivy League title Sunday.
Princeton locked-up an automatic NCAA bid by winning the Ivy League Championship Series over the weekend. The Tigers downed defending Ivy champion Dartmouth 8-5 on Sunday in the deciding game three of the series. The win gives Princeton (23-22) its 17th conference crown and first since 2006. While the Tigers are just a game over .500 this season, they handed LSU its first loss of the year back on March 6 in Baton Rouge.
The quarterfinalists for the National Pitcher of the Year Award were announced heading into the weekend, and it would be hard to make an argument against UCLA‘s Trevor Bauer as the current front runner for the honor. The junior fired his fifth straight complete game (and sixth this year) in Saturday’s 3-1 win over Oregon to help the Bruins to a three-game sweep in Eugene. Bauer (9-2) struckout 12 and leads the nation with 154 Ks. His 411 strikeouts make him the first Bruin with more than 400 in a career. He needs just 10 more Ks to set his own single season record from a year ago. Bauer’s efforts helped UCLA to its first road sweep of the season. The Bruin pitching staff has given-up just six runs over the last six games.
Oregon State's Tony Bryant
#7 Oregon State kept its steam train rolling by taking two of three games from #24 Cal. The Beavers (34-11, 14-4) have won each of their six Pac-10 Conferences series this season, while Cal (28-16, 12-9) has dropped two of its last three conference sets. OSU closer Tony Bryant earned his ninth save in as many chances this season in Sunday’s series clincher.
Pac-10 Standings
1. Oregon St 14-4 2. Arizona St 13-5 3. UCLA 14-7 4. Cal 12-8 5. Arizona 9-9 6. USC 8-10 7. Stanford 8-9 8. Oregon 5-12 9. Washington St. 4-13 and Washington 4-13
Ray Graham reached a career milestone over the weekend. The Rice head coach got carer win number 900 in Friday’s 8-2 win over cross-town rival Houston en-route to a series sweep. Graham and the Owls sit in second place behind Southern Mississippi in the Conference USA standings. The two teams meet in Hattiesburg, Miss to close the regular season.
Conference USA Standings
1. Southern Mississippi 14-4 2. Rice 12-6 3. East Carolina 11-10 4. Memphis & Houston 9-9 6. Tulane 8-10 7. UAB 9-12 8. UCF 7-11 9. Marshall 5-13
There were just two league series played in the ACC, with North Carolina and Wake Forest sweeping Maryland and Boston College, respectively. The rest of the teams in the league were either playing non-conference series or on break for final exams.
ACC Atlantic Standings
1. Florida State 16-8 2. Clemson 13-11 3. North Carolina State 11-13 4. Wake Forest 10-14 5. Boston College 7-19 6. Maryland 5-22 …
ACC Coastal Standings
1. Virginia 20-4 2. Georgia Tech 18-6 3. Miami 16-7 4. North Carolina 16-8 5. Virginia Tech 9-15 6. Duke 5-19
The West Coast Conference race got tighter when San Francisco dropped two of three at San Diego and Gonzaga swept Santa Clara. The Bulldogs now lead the WCC standings by percentage points over the Dons. Gonzaga (25-13-1, 9-3) has three conference series to play, while USF (25-22, 11-4) has just two left. The two teams meet in the regular season finale May 27-29 in Spokane. With no conference tournament, the WCC’s automatic NCAA bid is likely to be determined that weekend.
WCC Standings
1. Gonzaga 9-3 (.750) 2. San Francisco 11-4 (.733) 3. San Diego 8-7 4. Portland 6-6 5. Pepperdine 5-7 & Loyola Marymount 5-7 7. St. Mary’s 6-9 8. Santa Clara 4-11
Cal State Fullerton has won five of its last seven games since dropping two of three Big West Conference games to Cal Poly two weeks ago. The Titans (33-13, 14-4) swept three at Riverside over the weekend to inch closer to another conference crown. UC Irvine (31-13, 10-5) took two of three from Cal Poly (21-21, 10-8) and sits in good shape to get at least an at-large NCAA bid. Poly likely needs to win at least nine of its final 12 games to have a chance at the program’s second bid in the last three years (and in program history). They close the season with three games at Pacific, a game at Stanford and three at Cal State Bakersfield.
Big West Standings
1. Fullerton 14-4 2. Irvine 10-5 3. Cal Poly 10-8 4. Long Beach & Davis 8-7 5. Riverside & Santa Barbara 6-9 7. Pacific 7-11 8. Northridge 3-12
The longest active Division One hitting streak in the nation is still alive at 33 straight games after Ryan Jones collected at least one hit in each of Michigan State’s (30-14, 13-5) three weekend wins over Purdue. Jones’ efforts helped the Spartans improve to 9-0 in Big Ten home games this season. They went into the weekend tied for first place with the Boilermakers in the conference standings, but now lead Minnesota (which they swept last month) by two games with two series to go. The top six teams advance to the Big Ten Tournament.
Michigan State's Ryan Jones extended his DI leading hitting streak to 33 games.
Big Ten Standings
1. Michigan St. 13-5 2. Minnesota 11-7 3. Purdue, Ohio St. & Illinois 10-8 6. Penn St. & Indiana 8-10 9. Iowa & Northwestern 7-11 11. Michigan 6-12
Big East Standings
1. UConn 17-3 2. St. Johns 13-7 3. West Virginia 13-8 4. Pittsburgh 12-9 5. South Florida 11-9 6. Louisville & Cincinnati 11-10 8. Notre Dame 10-10 9. Seton Hall 10-11
Southern Conference Standings
1. Elon 21-6 2. Greensboro 16-8 3. Charleston 15-9 4. Samford & Georgia Southern 14-10 6. Appalachian St. 7. 12-11..Furman 10-13 8. Wofford & The Citadel 8-16
Southland Conference Standings
1. Texas St. 20-7 2. Stephen F. Austin 17-10 3. Sam Houston St. 16-11 4. Southeastern Louisiana 15-12 5. Texas A&M Corpus Christi 14-13 6. UT-Arlington & UT-San Antonio 13-14 8. McNeese & Nicholls 12-15
WAC Standings
1. Hawaii 12-4 2. Fresno St. 12-6 3. San Jose St. 9-7 4. New Mexico St. 7-8 5. Louisiana Tech 8-11 6. Nevada 6-9 7. Sacramento St. 3-12
America East Standings
1. Stony Brook 15-2 2. Binghamton 12-4 3. Maine 12-5 4. Albany 9-7 5. Hartford 1-15 6. UMBC 0-16
Atlantic-10 top-9
1. Charlotte & Rhode Island 15-6 3. LaSalle & Dayton 11-7 5. Xavier & Richmond 10-8 7. Fordham & St. Bonaventure 9-8 9. StLouis 7-11
Atlantic Sun top-8
1. Stetson 20-4 2. Jacksonville 18-9 3. Belmont 14-10 4. Kennesaw St. 13-10 5. East TN 12-10 6. Mercer 12-11 7. Florida Gulf Coast 11-13 8. North Florida 13-14
Big South Standings
1. Coastal Carolina 17-4 2. Liberty 15-6 3. Charelston Southern & Gardner-Webb 12-9 5. Winthrop 11-10 6. Radford 10-11 7. VMI 9-11, 8. UNC-Asheville & High Point 7-14 10. Presbyterian 5-16
Colonial Standings
1. Old Dominion 16-8 2. James Madison & UNC-Wilmington 15-9 4. Towson 14-10 5. Delaware 15-12 6. Georgia State & William and Mary 13-11 8. Northeastern 10-14 9. VCU & Hofstra 9-15 11. George Mason 6-21
Horizon League Standings
1. Wright St. 13-5 2. Valparaiso 13-6 3. Illinois-Chicago 11-7 4. Milwaukee 11-8 5. Youngstown St. 7-11 6. Butler 7-12 7. Cleveland St. 4-17
MAAC Standings
1. Manhattan 16-1 2. Rider 15-6 3. Siena 10-8 4. Marist & Fairfield 9-9 6. Canisius 8-8 7. Iona 7-11 8. St. Peter’s 4-13 9. Niagara 4-17
MAC East Standings
1. Kent St. 17-4 2. Miami 14-7 3. Bowling Green 10-11 4. Ohio 7-14 5. Akron 5-16 6. Buffalo 2-18
MAC West Standings
1. Central Michigan 14-7 2. Eastern Michigan & Toledo 13-8 4. Northern Illinois 12-9 5. Western Michigan 10-11 6. Ball St. 8-12
MEAC Standings
1. Bethune-Cookman 18-0 2. Delaware St 11-7 3. Norfolk St. & North Carolina A&T 9-8 5. Maryland-Eastern Shore 7-11 6. Florida A&M 6-12 7. Coppin St. 2-16
Missouri Valley Standings
1. Creighton 10-5 2. Wichita St. 9-6 3. Missouri St 8-6 4. Illinois St. & Southern Illinois 8-7 6. Evansville 6-8 7. Indiana St. 6-9 8. Bradley 4-11
Mountain West Standings
1. TCU 15-2 2. Utah 15-5 3. New Mexico 10-11 4. BYU 7-9 5. UNLV 7-10 6. San Diego State 7-11 7. Air Force 2-15
Northeast Conference Standings top-7
1. Monmouth 22-6 2. Sacred Heart 19-9 3. Long Island 18-9 4. Bryant 15-12 5. Central Connecticut St. 15-13 6. Wagner 12-16 7. Quinnipiac 11-21
OVC Standings top-7
Austin Peay 13-4…SE Missouri 10-6…Jacksonville (AL) St..TN Martin 9-8…E. Ill. 9-9…E. Kentucky 10-11..TN Tech 8-10
Summit League Standings
1. South Dakota St. 16-4 2. Oral Roberts 14-6 3. North Dakota St. 11-8 4. Western Illinois 10-10 5. Southern Utah & IPFW 8-12 6. Centenary 6-13
Sun Belt Standings top-8
1. Troy 16-7 2. Florida International 15-8 3. Florida Atlantic & Louisiana-Lafayette 14-9 5. Western Kentucky 13-10 6. South Alabama 11-12 7. Arkansas St. 10-13 8. Arkansas-Little Rock 8-15
SEC West Standings
1. Alabama & Arkansas 12-12 3. Auburn, Mississippi & Mississippi St. 11-13 6. LSU 8-16
SEC East Standings
1. Vanderbilt 19-5 2. South Carolina & Florida 18-6 4. Georgia 14-10 5. Kentucky & Tennessee 5-19
SEC TOURNAMENT SEEDINGS AS OF 5/9/11
1. VANDERBILT
2. ALABAMA (Won 2 of 3 vs. Arkansas)
3. SOUTH CAROLINA (Won 2 of 3 vs. UF)
4. FLORIDA (Lost 2 of 3 vs. SC)
5. GEORGIA
6. ARKANSAS (Lost 2 of 3 vs. Alabama)
7/8/9. AUBURN (2-1 vs. UM; 0-3 vs. MSU)
7/8/9. OLE MISS (1-2 vs. AU; TBD vs. MSU) 7/8/9. MISS. STATE (3-0 vs. AU; TBD vs. UM)
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10. LSU
11. TENNESSEE
12. KENTUCKY
Tournament Seeding Information
The eight teams that make up the 2011 Southeastern Conference Baseball Tournament are determined by the best winning percentage in conference competition.
The divisional champion with the highest conference winning percentage is the first seed and the remaining divisional champion is the second seed. All other teams are seeded 3-8 by conference winning percentage.
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