Texas A&M Baseball: Aggies appear in polls after winning Shriners College Classic

Texas A&M baseball (11-2) enjoyed a very nice week on the diamond winning the Shriners Hospital College Classic and splitting their midweek action.

Last week brought Texas A&M baseball their first blemish during the midweek with a tough loss to Incarnate Word (6-5). I predicted last week the Aggies would finish 11-3 in the midweek. With their win last night over Texas A&M Corpus Christi, their record currently sits at 4-1.

Before we take a look at the new polls, let’s take a quick look at the results from last week. The win over HBU gave the Aggies another chance at showing the depth of their pitching rotation. Chandler Jozwiak got the start and pitched into the fifth before Bryce Miller (who picked up the win) took over. Joseph Menefee, Brandon Birdsell and Colson Geisler also pitched in the game. A&M would allow five runs, only two were earned while striking out 16 batters.

The game the next night was a stark contrast with Incarnate Word coming to Blue Bell Park and racking up 13 hits and scoring six times to secure the win. Five different Aggies pitched Wednesday which tells us Rob Childress has plenty of arms to rely as the year continues. Yes, the pitching was not great, the problem this night was the Aggie offense was no where to be found. A&M could only muster eight hits and only two over the final 4.2 innings.

The loss had everyone wondering, could the Aggies survive Baylor and TCU in the college classic? I went to both games and the answer was a yes, but not a resounding yes. The pitching was absolutely fantastic all weekend, but the offense still has a lot of work ahead of them. After 13 games, As a team, the Aggies are hitting .232, and their average actually dropped over the weekend.

At this rate, John Doxakis and Asa Lacy will have to continue to be dominate for the Aggies to have a successful season. After three weeks, they definitely have been — let’s hope that continues. Over the weekend, the Aggies only scored nine runs, but that was enough to win all three games. Doxakis went eight innings against Baylor on Friday, Lacy and three others held TCU scoreless on Saturday and then five Aggies held Houston at bay Sunday to conclude a very solid weekend.

With those results, A&M made a major splash in the polls this week.

• Perfect Game / Rawlings make their season debut at No. 18
• NCBWA – No. 26
• Baseball America – still has Aggies unranked, conspiracy?
• D1Baseball –  season debut at No. 20
• Coaches – season debut at No. 22
• Collegiate Baseball – stayed at No. 23, really?

The Ags already dispatched our friends from Corpus Christi and face Abilene Christian on Wednesday. If the pitching continues to hold up, I expect the Aggies to win both before facing the Gonzaga Bulldogs in their final weekend tune-up before SEC conference play begins next week.

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