The Hogs are +2 on the Schluterman/Story Scale* after 4 SEC series.
*Win 2 out of 3 at home and 1 out of 3 on the road. You are 15-15 in Conference and solidly in a regional at the end of the season. Any time you get an extra win in the weekend you are plus 1 and conversely you can go negative. The most you can gain on a weekend is +2 for a road sweep. Conversely, the most you can go negative on a weekend is -2 for a home sweep. Finish the season plus 3 (18-12 in Conference) you are a likely Regional Host. Plus 5 and you are a likely National Seed.
Yeah nothing ever easy in this conference… just as I was telling someone the other day that by the time we play Mississippi State in Starkville they will be playing totally different than they have all year and you can already start to see that happening… smoked South Carolina that one game then went into Tuscaloosa and took 2/3.
Texas A&M will continue to play better every week. Tennessee and South Carolina at home will still be tug of wars and to end in Vandy will be very challenging.
The one thing we have going for us is Brady will be back by the end of the month and if he is dominant like he has been in closing, we will have 2 set up guys in Carter and Wood before we get to him… I think it will also allow Smith to go back into the rotation. This will be our strongest position since very early in the year, so we can do it!
We have to go to Georgia in a few weeks and I saw today they still have a couple of pitchers who absolutely wore us out when they were in Baum in 21. That will not be an easy series at all
This echoes what I have been posting here for years, almost verbatim. 15 SEC wins (many seasons in the SEC, 14) gets you in the NCAA Tournament; 17-18 Conference wins usually means a host for a Regional, and 19 or more puts you solidly in the conversations for a National seed.
I do pay attention to the Conference standings - and it’s great to win the Regular season SEC title (or the SECT); but I keep my “eye on the prize” which is Seeding/hosting in the NCAA Tournament.
UGA took 2 at home from UK today. Looks like UK isn’t quite as good as the first 3 weekends made them appear. OM is now the SEC bottom dweller. Might not make the SECT
I and on top of that Georgia is hard to beat at home. They should have swept Kentucky!
The hogs just need to worry about beating Tennessee next weekend and I hope the mid week games are rain outs! We don’t need the RPI drop by playing them.