2018 Mississippi State Bulldogs baseball team

The 2018 Mississippi State Bulldogs baseball team represents the Mississippi State University in the 2018 NCAA Division I baseball season. The Bulldogs play their home games at Dudy Noble Field. Due to construction of the new Dudy Noble Field, the first home game was not played until March 6, to give construction crews time to finish the bottom seating of the stadium. The new Dudy Noble Field in its entirety will not be completed until the 2019 season.

2018 Mississippi State Bulldogs baseball
ConferenceSoutheastern Conference
DivisionWestern Division
CBNo. 4
2018 record39–29 (15–15 SEC)
Head coach
Home stadiumDudy Noble Field, Polk–DeMent Stadium
2018 Southeastern Conference baseball standings
Conf  Overall
TeamW L PCT  W L PCT
East Division
No. 3 Florida  x‍†‍‍y 20–10 .667  49–21 .700
No. 20 Georgia  ‍‍‍y 18–12 .600  39–21 .650
No. 12 South Carolina ‍‍‍y 17–13 .567  37–26 .587
No. 16 Vanderbilt  ‍‍‍y 16–14 .533  35–27 .565
Kentucky  ‍‍‍ 13–17 .433  34–22 .607
Missouri  ‍‍‍ 12–18 .400  34–22 .607
Tennessee  ‍‍‍ 12–18 .400  29–27 .518
West Division
No. 19 Ole Miss  x‍‍‡‍y 18–12 .600  48–18 .727
No. 2 Arkansas  x‍‍‍y 18–12 .600  48–21 .696
No. 15 Auburn  ‍‍‍y 15–15 .500  43–23 .652
LSU  ‍‍‍y 15–15 .500  39–27 .591
No. 4 Mississippi State  ‍‍‍y 15–15 .500  39–29 .574
Texas A&M  ‍‍‍y 13–17 .433  40–22 .645
Alabama  ‍‍‍ 8–22 .267  27–29 .482
x – Division champion
† – Conference champion
‡ – Tournament champion
y – Invited to the NCAA Tournament
Rankings from Collegiate Baseball

Personnel

Coaching staff
2018 Mississippi State Bulldogs coaching staff
  • Andy Cannizaro – Head Coach (first 3 games) – 2nd year
  • Gary Henderson – Pitching Coach – 2nd year; Interim Head Coach (starting game 4)
  • Jake Gautreau – Assistant Coach – 1st year
  • Mike Brown – Coordinator of Camps/Volunteer Assistant – 2nd year
  • A.J. Gaura – Coordinator of Baseball Player Development – 1st year
  • Trevor Fitts – Coordinator of Baseball Operations – 1st year

Schedule and results
2018 Mississippi State Bulldogs Baseball Game Log
Regular Season (31–24)
Post-Season (8–5)
College World Series (2–2)
Date Opponent Rank Site/Stadium Score Win Loss Save TV Attendance Overall Record CWS Record
June 16vs. #7 Washington#8TD Ameritrade Park • Omaha, NEW 1–0Zach Neff (4–3)Alex Hardy (5–3)noneESPN24,75838–271–0
June 18vs. (6) #3 North Carolina#8TD Ameritrade Park • Omaha, NEPostponed to 6/19, inclement weather
June 19vs. (6) #3 North Carolina#8TD Ameritrade Park • Omaha, NEW 12–2Konnor Pilkington (3–6)Austin Bergner (7–3)Cole Gordon (4)ESPN213,38739–272–0
June 22vs. (3) #1 Oregon State#8TD Ameritrade Park • Omaha, NEL 2–12Brandon Eisert (5–3)Jacob Billingsley (5–4)noneESPN21,00239–282–1
June 23vs. (3) #1 Oregon State#8TD Ameritrade Park • Omaha, NEL 2–5Kevin Abel (6–1)Ethan Small (5–4)noneESPN21,82139–292–2

† Indicates the game does not count toward the 2018 Southeastern Conference standings.
*Rankings are based on the team's current ranking in the Collegiate Baseball poll.

Rankings
Main article: 2018 NCAA Division I baseball rankings
Ranking movements
Legend: ██ Increase in ranking. ██ Decrease in ranking.
NR = Not ranked. RV = Received votes. т = Tied with team above or below. ( ) = First place votes.
Week
Poll Pre 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 Final 
Coaches'[1] 15 15* 15* RV RV NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR RV RV RV* RV* 6 
Baseball America[2] NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR 25 NR NR* NR* 6 
Collegiate Baseball^[3] 13 NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR NR 16 8 4 
NCBWA†[4] 17 25 27 26 21 RV RV NR NR RV NR RV NR 28 RV 16 16* 4 
D1Baseball

^ Collegiate Baseball ranks 40 teams in their preseason poll, but only ranks 30 teams weekly during the season.
 † NCBWA ranks 35 teams in their preseason poll, but only ranks 30 teams weekly during the season.
 * New poll was not released for this week so for comparison purposes the previous week's ranking is inserted in this week's slot.

MLB Draft
Player Position Round Overall MLB Team
Konnor Pilkington LHP 3 81 Chicago White Sox
J P France RHP 14 432 Houston Astros
Hunter Stovall 2B 21 636 Colorado Rockies
Ethan Small† LHP 26 789 Arizona Diamondbacks
Zach Neff LHP 31 934 Minnesota Twins
Jake Mangum‡ LHP 32 950 New York Mets
Jacob Billingsley RHP 32 972 Houston Astros

[5]

†Small, a redshirt sophomore, returns to MSU for the next season.[6]
‡Mangum, a junior, returns to MSU for the next season. Although Mangum had almost exclusively played CF in college and pitched very little, he was drafted as a pitcher.[7]

Recruiting

Mississippi State only has the Perfect Game 8th rated 2018 recruiting class in spite of having two players, Carter Stewart and J. T. Ginn, both RHPs, go in the 1st round of the MLB draft and two more, Eric Cerantola and Sam Knowlton, both also RHPs, go in the 33rd and 39th, who did not sign to play professionally after this draft, although there is some speculation that Stewart may go JUCO instead.[6][8][9] Perfect Game only covers commitments out of high school. There is also a JUCO player, Gunner Halter, SS, taken in the 26th round who plans to play for Mississippi State.[10] There are also two high schoolers that were not drafted, probably due to difficulty of being signed, who were projected as top 10 rounders, Hayden Jones, C, and Christian McLeod, LHP.[9][11][12] In addition to the four RHPs, C, LHP, and JUCO SS mentioned above, high school players also include three OFs, a RHP, two SSs, and a C.[9]

References
  1. "USA Today Coaches' Poll". Archived from the original on 2017-07-10. Retrieved 2018-04-05.
  2. Baseball America Poll
  5. "Mississippi State Baseball Has Seven Players Drafted In 2018 MLB Draft". FanSided Inc. June 2018. Retrieved 28 June 2018.
  6. "MSU signee, MLB first-round pick Stewart doesn't sign with Braves". Starkville Daily News. July 6, 2018. Archived from the original on 7 July 2018. Retrieved 7 July 2017.
  7. "Jake Mangum Announces He's Returning To Mississippi State Baseball". FanSided Inc. June 2018. Retrieved 28 June 2017.
  8. "College Recruit Rankings Class of 2018". Perfect Game. 2018. Retrieved 7 July 2017.
  9. "Mississippi State's HS Recruits Class of 2018". Perfect Game. 2018. Retrieved 7 July 2017.
  10. "Halter chooses MSU over professional path". Starkville Daily News. July 3, 2018. Archived from the original on 4 July 2018. Retrieved 7 July 2017.
  11. "2018 MSU Baseball Signee Hayden Jones Update". CBS INTERACTIVE. May 23, 2018. Retrieved 7 July 2017.
  12. "LHP Christian MacLeod Primed for Immediate Impact at MSU". CBS INTERACTIVE. Jul 1, 2018. Retrieved 7 July 2017.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.