South Carolina Baseball: Gamecocks finish ranked in the final polls

South Carolina baseball had a good, although up-and-down, 2023 season. The Gamecocks were downright unbeatable at times but struggled to put it all together down the stretch of the regular season, setting themselves up for a tougher-than-it-should-have-been postseason run.

Because of this, after winning their hosted regional, the Gamecocks matched up with the Florida Gators in the super regional round of the NCAA Tournament.

Despite sweeping the Gators in the regular season, the Gamecocks fell in a 2-game sweep in Gainesville to end their season. Florida went on to a national title series berth and lost to LSU in a winner-take-all game for the championship on Monday night.

Despite the inconsistent play during the back half of the season, South Carolina baseball had two first-team All-Americans on the field in 2023. Freshman right fielder Ethan Petry and sophomore catcher Cole Messina were granted the honors by multiple publications.

With the season officially over after last night’s championship finale, D1Baseball has released their final top-25 poll of the 2023 college baseball season.

The Gamecocks placed 13th in the final poll and were the 5th-highest ranked SEC program behind only the two championship participants (LSU Tigers and Florida Gators), a Men’s College World Series participant (Tennessee Volunteers), and a fellow super regional loser (Alabama Crimson Tide).

Carolina finished ahead of SEC rivals such as the Arkansas Razorbacks, Kentucky Wildcats, and Vanderbilt Commodores (6 more teams in the league were unranked). The Gamecocks also finished ahead of the rival Clemson Tigers.

The entire top-25 ranking from D1Baseball is listed below:

1. LSU Tigers
2. Florida Gators
3. Wake Forest Demon Deacons
4. Stanford Cardinal
5. TCU Horned Frogs
6. Virginia Cavaliers
7. Tennessee Volunteers
8. Oral Roberts Golden Eagles
9. Southern Miss Golden Eagles
10. Alabama Crimson Tide
11. Indiana State Sycamores
12. Oregon Ducks
13. South Carolina Gamecocks
14. Texas Longhorns
15. Duke Blue Devils
16. Arkansas Razorbacks
17. Kentucky Wildcats
18. Clemson Tigers
19. Vanderbilt Commodores
20. Miami Hurricanes
21. Coastal Carolina Chanticleers
22. Campbell Fighting Camels
23. Oregon State Beavers
24. East Carolina Pirates
25. Dallas Baptist Patriots

Other publications had South Carolina baseball ranked 10th (USA Today), 11th (Perfect Game), 13th (National College Baseball Writers Association), 14th (Collegiate Baseball), and 17th (Baseball America) in their final polls for the 2023 college baseball season.