In preseason media conferences, Arizona State (32-24, 17-13 Pac-12) baseball head coach Willie Bloomquist discussed a non-conference schedule full of major challenges as a focal point for an eventual NCAA Tournament resumé.
“I will not get burned by RPI again,” he said.
In recent years, the NCAA’s RPI metric, a rating that measures a team’s performance against its strength of schedule, has been a critical benchmark for selection to the field of 64. Despite near identical overall records at this point and a greater emphasis on tougher competition in the non-conference, ASU enters conference championship week 75th in the RPI. In contrast, they went into Selection Monday in 2023 at 54th. Of course, the Devils didn’t hear their name called to the NCAA Tournament then. But, they are on a different plane at this stage of the season, which gives them reason for optimism.
Entering last year’s Pac-12 Tournament, ASU had fallen off a cliff from a strong three months, dropping 10 of its final 13 regular season games to drop from host contention to all the way out of the tournament. Their fate would be sealed in a 12-3 loss at the hands of Arizona in pool play, eliminating them before the knockout stage. This time around, the Devils have rebounded from a shaky start, claiming victory in 15 of their last 18 contests, including all of their last six. Having not lost a weekend set since mid-April, ASU’s offense has emerged as one of the hottest in the nation, scoring 10+ runs in all of its last 13 wins to lead its resurrection despite its inconsistency on the mound.
Their performance down the stretch reflects well in the ELO metric. Ranking teams on a run-value calculation of recent form, ASU sits in 33rd, near the likes of tournament locks such as Arizona, West Virginia, and Dallas Baptist. In 2023, just one school inside the top 40 in this statistic missed the NCAA Tournament, and the Sun Devils were way on the outside at 54th. One would think ASU would be less anxious this week considering their high mark in the ELO, but none of last year’s at-large qualifiers sported an RPI higher than 54th, and the Sun Devils currently sit at 75th.
For comparison, the worst Pac-12 school to be granted an at-large bid in the RPI era was the 2017 UCLA Bruins, whose mark of 65th was just enough. In its season, the Bruins stacked quality wins with five victories over the RPI top 25 to set them apart. This year’s Arizona State club has zero such wins.
Despite what appeared to be a challenging non-conference schedule in February, of ASU’s opponents, only Texas A&M, in play for the top national seed, has held up high in the RPI. TCU and Kansas State are both teetering on the tournament bubble with marks at 39 and 41, respectively, while Texas Tech’s recent slump has them down at 58th and on the outside looking in. Among Pac-12 foes, the Sun Devils claimed a season-split or sweep over just two of the teams ahead of them in Arizona (28th) and California (65th).
The Golden Bears and Utah have been mentioned in the “First Four Out” category by either D1Baseball or Baseball America. Despite the Utes taking two of three in Phoenix Municipal Stadium, Arizona State has Utah beat on the RPI by five spots.
Even for these data points, the Sun Devils still control their destiny in a top-heavy Pac-12 Tournament, and their scorching stretch suggests they can storm through Scottsdale in a similar fashion to Arizona in 2023. Facing similar circumstances last spring, the rival Wildcats got hot late and used their momentum to topple ASU and then No. 10 Oregon State in pool play before run-ruling No. 3 Stanford in the semifinals. While they came up a run short in the title game against Oregon, UofA’s trio of quality wins proved enough for them to be selected to the 2023 NCAA Tournament.
Arizona State’s placement in the Pac-12 Tournament offers them a similar opportunity. First matched up with a slumping Stanford squad in its first matchup of pool play, the Sun Devils are then slated to face No. 6 Oregon State on Thursday. Being the fifth seed in the tournament, ASU has to win both of these games to advance to the semifinals, a must in order to improve their standing in the RPI. Going on the road in the regular season against both of these teams, the Sun Devils took the brooms out against Stanford earlier this month but went winless in Corvallis at the start of April.
From an optimist’s point of view, Stanford has continued to slide, suggesting the Sun Devils should be favored in that matchup. As for Thursday, ASU competed in two of its losses to the Beavers last month, which came in the midst of a five-game losing streak well before the Sun Devils found their recent form of destruction on offense. As safe a bet to host a regional as there is, Oregon State assumingly won’t be playing with the sense of urgency of ASU, whose postseason lives could be at stake. Should the Sun Devils advance out of Pool B, they could take on other near-locks in No. 14 Arizona and No. 23 Oregon, which victories over would further improve their odds. At the same time, a run to the final Pac-12 Tournament title would grant them an automatic bid to the postseason, as it does in college basketball.
Despite its six-game winning streak, neither D1Baseball nor Baseball mentioned Arizona State in its bracket projections or any postseason prospective content as of Sunday. While anything can change in the final week, as both Arizona schools showed last year, the Devils will likely need to advance out of Pool B at the very least to join a crowded bubble.
Unlike the basketball committee, the NCAA baseball brain trust has typically favored teams that play well down the stretch, specifically in conference tournaments. The maroon and gold need at least two victories and likely a trip to the conference title game to have even a 50-50 shot at being selected.
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