Kentucky baseball (20-4 5-1 SEC) entered the Week Seven D1Baseball Top 25 rankings for the first time all season, coming in at No. 24 on Monday.
The Wildcats began their week with a midweek home victory over Evansville before traveling to Columbia, Missouri, for a series with the Tigers in which the Cats took game one in 11 innings by a score of 9-4, dropped game two in a pitcher’s duel and won a deciding game three.
With the results, the Cats find themselves amongst the nine SEC teams featured throughout the rankings.
The SEC starts with the No. 1 Arkansas Razorbacks, who went 2-1 on the weekend, taking the first two games against the Auburn Tigers before dropping the series finale.
The next SEC representation comes in the form of the No. 4 Texas A&M Aggies, who jumped three spots from No. 7 after finishing 3-1 on the weekend with a midweek victory over Prairie View A&M before taking the first and third game of a weekend series against Mississippi State.
Coming at the No. 5 spot is the Tennessee Volunteers, who moved up from No. 8 after they finished 3-1 on the week with a midweek win over Xavier before taking the first and third games against the Ole Miss Rebels.
Right behind them at No. 6 is the Florida Gators, who finished 2-2 on the weekend, which started with a midweek loss to Jacksonville. They then traveled to Baton Rouge for a 2023 College World Series rematch and dropped the first game of the series before they bested the Tigers in game two and three.
In the next spot lies the No. 7 Vanderbilt Commodores, who dropped four spots from No. 3 as they finished 1-3 on the week with a midweek win over Belmont before being swept by South Carolina.
Rounding out an SEC foursome is the defending champion No. 8 LSU Tigers, who fell five spots from No. 5 after finishing 2-2 on the week with a midweek win over Louisiana Tech before dropping two out of three to the Florida Gators.
After a slight break, the SEC picks back up with No. 16 Alabama. The Crimson Tide fell five spots from No. 11 after going 1-3 on the week, beating Alabama State before being swept by the Georgia Bulldogs in a three-game weekend series.
Two spots later came No. 18 South Carolina, who saw the biggest jump in the rankings as they were unranked entering the week but finished it 4-0 with a win over USC Upstate and the aforementioned sweep of Vanderbilt.
The Wildcats and the Gamecocks are accompanied by Kansas State and North Carolina State as the new teams to join the rankings, replacing TCU, Campbell, Auburn and UC Santa Barbara.
The Oklahoma Sooners saw the biggest drop in the rankings as they went from No. 17 to No. 25 after a 1-3 week.
A full list of the rankings can be found below:
- Arkansas Razorbacks (19-3)
- Oregon State Beavers (21-2)
- Clemson Tigers (22-2)
- Texas A&M Aggies (21-3)
- Tennessee Volunteers (21-4)
- Florida Gators (14-9)
- Vanderbilt Commodores (19-6)
- LSU Tigers (19-6)
- Virginia Cavaliers (20-4)
- Dallas Baptist Patriots (19-4)
- Duke Blue Devils (17-7)
- Wake Forest Demon Deacons (16-7)
- Virginia Tech Hokies (18-4)
- North Carolina Tar Heels (21-4)
- East Carolina Pirates (16-6)
- Alabama Crimson Tide (18-6)
- Florida State Seminoles (19-3)
- South Carolina Gamecocks (19-5)
- Coastal Carolina Chanticleers (18-6)
- UC Irvine Anteaters (17-3)
- Mississippi State Bulldogs (17-8)
- North Carolina State Wolfpack (15-7)
- Kansas State Wildcats (17-6)
- Kentucky Wildcats (20-4)
- Oklahoma Sooners (14-9)
