Diamond Heels fall four spots in D1Baseball rankings

Last weekend provided the UNC baseball team a golden opportunity to prove its worth as a Top 25 team.

The Diamond Heels made the short trip down to Raleigh, facing an NC State program that’s also amongst one of the ACC’s best. The Wolfpack are playing solid baseball this season, but with how good North Carolina’s been, it should’ve won the series handily.

Even though UNC remains two games ahead of archrival Duke for first place in the ACC Coastal Division, UNC proved there’s still questions surrounding its ability to beat tough competition, as it dropped two of three at NC State.

As a result, the Diamond Heels fell four spots – to 15th – in Monday’s D1Baseball rankings.

Welcome back to the D1Baseball Top 25, @OU_Baseball and @NCStateBaseball 👋

The Sooners and Wolfpack jump back in at Nos. 18 and 21 after taking series against BYU and North Carolina, respectively ☝️🐺

FULL RANKINGS 👉 https://t.co/hJMj6ADXdV pic.twitter.com/MOKpeEKOVM

— D1Baseball (@d1baseball) April 22, 2024

North Carolina (30-10, 15-6) left no doubt of its talent in Saturday’s series finale, dominating in a 14-3 victory behind reliable bats and a surprisingly good pitching performance. Star UNC center fielder Vance Honeycutt, a projected first-round pick in July’s MLB Draft, became the only player in ACC history to join the 50 home run-70 stolen base club during the finale.

The Diamond Heels have a super-winnable game against Gardner-Webb on Tuesday, April 23, then host a tough Virginia Tech squad this coming weekend for a 3-game series. The Hokies (25-12, 12-9) dropped out of this week’s rankings after spending most of 2024 ranked.