Rutgers baseball has had a strong second half of the season, putting their out-of-conference struggles in the rearview mirror.
But will the NCAA Tournament committee look back when it comes to Rutgers this season? That’s the debate right now for the Scarlet Knights as they close out the regular season this weekend.
The good news for Rutgers? They are currently 32-19 and have a 13-8 record in the Big Ten. They are in fourth place in the conference and have won seven of their last 10 games.
But the early season struggles, despite being a thing of the past, may not be forgotten.
Were Rutgers to win the Big Ten Tournament, this conversation would of course be settled. But Rutgers doesn’t have a great resume for an at-large bid as things currently stand.
The most recent RPI update has Rutgers at No. 50 in the nation (one spot behind Maryland, who won the Big Ten regular season last year and are currently tied atop the Big Ten this year).
And as noted in the Week 14 ‘Nerdcast,’ Rutgers is 1-6 against top 50 programs.
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The most recent projections from D1Baseball has Rutgers as the third-to-last team cut from the NCAA Tournament based off the current standings. They join Texas State, Georgia Tech and Louisiana in the last four out of the NCAA Tournament.
As the podcast dives into, Rutgers’ slow start to the regular season hurts their poseason resume.
They started the year losing two of three at Campbell, then lost two of three in the Swig & Swine Classic in South Carolina. Being swept by UNC Greensboro and then in early March at UConn also hurt their postseason resume significantly.
What seems to be true, however, is that Rutgers has to take care of business this weekend at Minnesota and, at the very least, needs to make a run in the Big Ten Tournament in order to be under serious consideration.
A sweep of Minnesota could vault Rutgers into third place this week to close out the Big Ten regular season. A couple of wins in the conference tournament and maybe, just maybe, Rutgers baseball can sneak in.
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