It sounds like Southeastern Conference “It just means more” level hype, but winning the SEC regular-season baseball championship might be harder than winning the College World Series.
We’ve seen that just about any team that makes it to the NCAA tournament can get hot enough to win the CWS. We present as evidence Ole Miss last year, which looked like it wouldn’t even earn an NCAA bid before sweeping LSU at Alex Box Stadium, Coastal Carolina in 2016 or Fresno State as a regional No. 4 seed in 2008. You can also take those Rebels, Chanticleers and Bulldogs as evidence that pessimistic talk of LSU being unable to win the CWS this season because of inadequate pitching is way too premature.
Winning the College World Series of course is always the number one, no-excuses goal for LSU baseball. But winning an SEC championship, something the Tigers haven’t done since 2017 (there was no title awarded in 2020) is a goal any team anywhere would be proud to put in their trophy case. Especially when you look at Saturday morning’s NCAA RPI rankings and see five of the top six and six of the nation’s top 10 are from the “It just means more” league.
“It would be an outstanding accomplishment,” LSU coach Jay Johnson said after the Tigers 12-1 win Friday over Mississippi State. “I’m proud of them for being consistent and competing. They’re made out of the right stuff.”
Consistency and quality has been the hallmark of LSU’s season, the reason they were No. 1 in the national polls until this week and near the top of the NCAA’s RPI ratings and SEC standings.
But a bit of bad luck and a lack of a championship-worthy policy could conspire to deny LSU (or another contender) an SEC regular-season title. An issue the SEC could decide to address but never has.
Going into Saturday’s play, here was the top four in the SEC standings:
1. Arkansas 37-12, 18-7 SEC
2. LSU 39-10, 17-7 SEC
3. Vanderbilt 35-14, 17-8 SEC
4. Florida 38-12, 16-9 SEC
The Tigers, a scribble of quick math will tell you, has played one less SEC game that it’s fellow contenders. That’s because its April 8 series finale at South Carolina was cancelled due to weather.
Because of that lost game, LSU entered Saturday’s home game with Mississippi State a half-game behind Arkansas in the SEC West and overall SEC standings and a half-game ahead of SEC East leader Vanderbilt. That is where LSU could also still find itself next Saturday when the regular season is completed.
You could say, as in golf, that’s just the rub of the green. Those are the breaks. Except for the fact that the game on April 8 could have been played. LSU, I’ve been told, wanted to play. But as the home team it was South Carolina’s call.
That needs to change. The integrity of the SEC regular-season championship should be so important that the conference had the authority to compel South Carolina to figure out a way to play LSU (the weather had improved enough that night that the game could have started). Perhaps they could have waited until the season ended to see if the game indeed had an impact on the SEC championship. Then the SEC could have made LSU travel back to Columbia to play the game or have two teams meet in Hoover, Alabama, before the SEC tournament begins. That could be tough because it could impact tournament seeding and possibly who makes the tournament, but who wins the SEC regular-season championship should be at least or more important than who wins the conference tournament.
Certainly in this case there is no guarantee or maybe even a probability that LSU would have won the cancelled game with South Carolina if it had been played. The Tigers had to rally for five runs in the final two innings to pull out an 8-7 win on April 7 to leave Columbia with a split in the first place. At the time the Gamecocks were playing like one of the best teams in the country. If they played now, South Carolina, which has been hit hard by injuries, might be easier prey for LSU.
If they played in Hoover, would Johnson pitch ace Paul Skenes with an SEC championship on the line or go with someone else? Would South Carolina throw its ace or stake more on winning the SEC tournament? The possibilities are endlessly intriguing.
However you do it, they should try to make it happen if the championship will otherwise be decided by a half-game either way. It’s that important. Or, to make a play on the SEC’s own words, “It should mean more.”
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