Jan. 22, 2009
COLLEGE STATION, Texas - The back-to-back Big 12 Champion Texas A&M baseball team is ranked fifth in the USA Today/ESPN Preseason Coaches' poll, released Thursday.
The Aggies, who are the highest of five Big 12 teams in the poll, received two first-place votes. LSU topped the chart, followed by North Carolina, Rice and Georgia. Stanford was No. 6, Arizona State No. 7, and Cal State Fullerton No. 8, with Florida State and Texas tying for ninth.
Along with the third-ranked Owls, seventh-ranked Titans and ninth-ranked Longhorns, other 2009 opponents appearing in the poll were No. 13 Oklahoma State, No. 17 Baylor, No. 18 UC Irvine and No. 20 Missouri. Nebraska, TCU, Oklahoma and Dallas Baptist were among those receiving votes.
Texas A&M, which took the top spot in the Baseball America preseason ranking earlier in the week, is also ranked No. 4 by the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association and No. 9 by Collegiate Baseball newspaper.
The USA Today/ESPN poll is voted on by head coaches at 31 Division I institutions.
Fans will get plenty of opportunities to see the Aggies in action in 2009, as A&M hosts a 37-game home schedule which features Cal State Fullerton, Nebraska, Oklahoma State, TCU, Houston, Texas and Baylor, among others. The opener is set for Friday, Feb. 20 against Wright State, and season tickets are available now by logging on to aggieathletics.com or by calling 1-888-99-AGGIE.
The USA TODAY/ESPN Top 25 Coaches' Poll
TEAM PTS PVS ---- --- --- 1. LSU (14) 738 6 2. NORTH CAROLINA (12) 737 3 3. RICE (1) 673 7 4. GEORGIA 600 2 5. TEXAS A&M (2) 590 12 6. STANFORD (1) 576 5 7. ARIZONA ST 533 9 8. CS FULLERTON 507 10 9. (tie) FLORIDA ST 500 8 9. (tie) TEXAS 500 21 11. OLE MISS 431 NR 12. GEORGIA TECH 327 24 13. OKLAHOMA ST 321 18 14. MIAMI FL 320 4 15. SAN DIEGO 304 17 16. LOUISVILLE 292 NR 17. BAYLOR 269 NR 18. UC IRVINE 262 11 19. FRESNO ST (1) 247 1 20. MISSOURI 224 19 21. PEPPERDINE 156 NR 22. UCLA 140 NR 23. FLORIDA 112 NR 24. COASTL CAROLINA 102 16 25. CLEMSON 80 NR
Others Receiving Votes: KENTUCKY 64, ARIZONA 56, WICHITA ST 40, NEBRASKA 36, TCU 32, EAST CAROLINA 28, NC STATE 28, OKLAHOMA 28, TULANE 23, USC 21, ALABAMA 20, MICHIGAN 19, OREGON ST 19, ARKANSAS 17, KENT ST 16, LONG BEACH ST 13, VANDERBILT 13, AUBURN 10, CALIFORNIA 10, SOUTH CAROLINA 10, SAN DIEGO ST 5, MISSOURI ST 3, UNC WILMINGTON 3, SOUTHERN MISS 3, WASHINGTON 3, DALLAS BAPTIST 3, WESTRN KENTUCKY 3, JMU 2, NOTRE DAME 2, BETHUNE COOKMAN 1, ELON 1, ORAL ROBERTS 1, VIRGINIA 1.