FAYETTEVILLE — The Arkansas Razorbacks are back atop the college baseball rankings.
Arkansas (13-2), which has won nine consecutive games, was ranked No. 1 in the USA Today Baseball Coaches Poll on Monday. The Razorbacks are scheduled to host Oral Roberts on Tuesday and Missouri in the SEC-opening series beginning Friday at Baum-Walker Stadium.
Wake Forest, ranked No. 1 since the regular season began and in 7 of 8 polls dating last season, relinquished the top spot after it lost twice at home to Duke over the weekend. The Demon Deacons fell to No. 5 and Duke moved up four places to No. 7.
Arkansas, ranked third last week, jumped LSU in the coaches poll to claim the top spot. The Razorbacks and the Tigers were separated by 21 voting points last week when LSU claimed three first-place votes.
Arkansas received 18 of 31 first-place votes in this week’s poll and edged the Tigers by 40 points.
Five teams — Arkansas, LSU (6), Oregon State (1), Texas A&M (3) and Wake Forest (3) — received first-place votes this week.
LSU (14-2) went 3-1 since last week’s poll, including a 2-1 home loss to Xavier on Sunday in the third game of the series. The Tigers also defeated Xavier by scores of 4-0 and 8-2, and defeated Southeastern Louisiana 4-3 during a midweek game last week.
LSU is scheduled to play at Arkansas on March 28-30.
The Razorbacks are No. 1 in the coaches poll for the first time since the final poll of the 2021 regular season. Arkansas held the top spot for 11 weeks that year.
The Razorbacks are a consensus No. 1 this week, also ranked first by D1Baseball, Baseball America and Perfect Game. The coaches poll is the poll of record for WholeHogSports.com.
Oregon State, ranked third by coaches, is ranked first by the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association. The Beavers' only loss was 5-4 to Arkansas on Feb. 23 in Arlington, Texas.
Eight SEC teams are ranked in this week’s coaches poll to lead all conferences. In addition to Arkansas and LSU, other SEC teams in the poll are Texas A&M (4), Tennessee (6), Vanderbilt (10), Florida (11), Alabama (12), Auburn (19) and South Carolina (20).
Arkansas won a pair of close games over Central Arkansas (9-7) and McNeese State (3-1) in its first two games last week before catching fire at the end. The Razorbacks won via run rule twice against McNeese State, 11-1 in 8 innings in the second game of a Saturday doubleheader, and 18-5 in 7 innings Sunday.
“It was a good weekend for us,” Arkansas coach Dave Van Horn said Sunday. “We obviously won them all. We played fairly well, pitched fairly well but not great, but we’ve got some pitchers who know how to get out of jams and they held them down this weekend.”
The Razorbacks have been ranked in the coaches poll for 97 consecutive weeks dating to 2017. Arkansas has been ranked in the top 10 of the poll for 49 of the past 51 weeks.
USA Today Baseball Coaches Poll, March 11
1. Arkansas (13-2)
2. LSU (14-2)
3. Oregon State (15-1)
4. Texas A&M (16-0)
5. Wake Forest (12-3)
6. Tennessee (16-1)
7. Duke (13-2)
8. TCU (14-2)
9. Clemson (13-1)
10. Vanderbilt (14-3)
11. Florida (10-5)
12. Alabama (15-1)
13. North Carolina (14-2)
14. North Carolina State (12-2)
15. Virginia (13-3)
16. East Carolina (10-4)
17. Coastal Carolina (14-2)
18. Dallas Baptist (13-2)
19. Auburn (12-3)
T20. South Carolina (13-3)
T20. UC Irvine (13-1)
22. Florida State (14-0)
23. Campbell (11-4)
24. Texas (9-6)
25. Texas Tech (11-4)