The Gophers took two out of three on the road against Michigan, improving to 33-14 on the season and 15-5 in the Big Ten. Minnesota currently sits in first place in the conference with one more series left to play in the regular season. The Gophers travel to Happy Valley to take on Penn State in their final tune up before the Big Ten tournament and, more than likely, the NCAA Tournament.
If you haven’t been following the Gophers too closely recently they are completely on fire. Since dropping two in a row to Illinois back on April 17-18 they had won nine straight conference games before losing to Michigan on Sunday (John Anderson was denied his 1000th win in the process) with one strange loss to Division III St. Thomas sandwiched in the middle.
Their reward? Their highest ranking in any national poll this season. Baseball America placed them at #21, while both Collegiate Baseball Magazine and Rivals put them at #24. This marks the first time the Gophers have been ranked in the Rivals poll this season.
Derek McCallum is having a ridiculous season hitting .403-16-66. He leads the conference in batting average, slugging percentage, hits, RBIs, home runs, and total bases. He is also second in on-base percentage. Unbelievable.
AJ Pettersen checks in at 12th in the conference in batting average and first in runs scored. Tom Buske owns the conference’s fifth best ERA.
Now Minnesota just has to take care of business on the road at Penn State (7-14 in the Big Ten) if they want to take the top seed in the Big Ten tournament in Columbus, OH. The NCAA tournament is starting to look more and more like a lock.
The Gophers have been mentioned as legitimate postseason participants in several publications. More often than not they are slated to be a #2 seed in whichever region they appear in, meaning they would have to travel for the tournament. For instance, ESPN’s Jeremy Mills puts them in Texas A&M’s region.
But chew on this — the Gophers actually have a chance to host a regional. The NCAA has been trying to nationalize baseball for years (read: not have the South dominate year in and year out) and would love nothing more than to have a northern team host a regional. Should the Gophers win out the rest of the season, they actually have a chance to end up as a number one seed in a region.
Even if they don’t end up with a #1 seed somewhere, it’s not out of the ordinary for a #2 seed to host a region if it makes geographical sense. Word on the street is that John Anderson has been making a push to host the region at the Dome (Hey, it never rains indoors), and with the NCAA’s push to get the North interested in college baseball, it’s not out of the question that we could see a postseason region held right here in Minneapolis.
Stay tuned.
