BATON ROUGE, La. — LSU is No. 4 in the 2017 Baseball America preseason poll released Monday, marking the Tigers’ fourth Top 5 preseason ranking. LSU is No. 2 in the Collegiate Baseball and Perfect Game preseason polls, and the Tigers are No. 5 in the D1 Baseball preseason ranking.
LSU is one of three Southeastern Conference teams appearing in the 2017 Baseball America preseason Top 10, along with No. 3 Florida and No. 5 South Carolina. SEC representative Vanderbilt also appears in the Top 25 at No. 11.
TCU, which LSU will face on March 3 at Minute Maid Park in Houston, is No. 1 in the Baseball America poll. LSU’s other non-conference opponents appearing in the poll are No. 13 Louisiana-Lafayette, No. 24 Maryland and No. 25 Texas Tech.
The Tigers begin preseason practice Friday at 3:15 p.m. in Alex Box Stadium, Skip Bertman Field. LSU opens the 2017 season at 7 p.m. on Friday, February 17 when the Tigers play host to Air Force.
2017 Baseball America Preseason Poll
1. Texas Christian
2. Florida State
3. Florida
4. LSU
5. South Carolina
6. East Carolina
7. Louisville
8. Cal State Fullerton
9. Oregon State
10. Clemson
11. Vanderbilt
12. Washington
13. Louisiana-Lafayette
14. North Carolina State
15. Coastal Carolina
16. Virginia
17. North Carolina
18. Oklahoma State
19. UC Santa Barbara
20. Long Beach State
21. Georgia Tech
22. Arizona
23. Stanford
24. Maryland
25. Texas Tech