Clemson baseball had its worst series of the 2025 season against rival NC State last weekend.
The Tigers (36-10 overall, 13-8 ACC) were swept in three games at Raleigh’s Doak Field, where the surging Wolfpack (30-12, 15-6) outscored the Tigers 26-8. NC State got a rule-rule victory in the series opener on Thursday after sophomore right-hander Aidan Knaak turned in his worst start of the season: eight runs, 11 hits, four innings. Clemson’s bats managed just five hits in Saturday’s 4-1 loss to complete the sweep.
It was the first time all season that coach Erik Bakich’s team had dropped a weekend series. By contrast, NC State surged to the top of the ACC standings at 15-6 in conference play and to No. 13 in one Top 25 poll.
Speaking of Top 25 rankings, Clemson didn’t fall far in Monday’s new USA TODAY Sports Coaches Poll, dropping only two spots to No. 4. D1 Baseball gave the Tigers their highest ranking, dropping them only one spot to No. 3, while The Athletic placed Clemson at No. 5 in its latest college baseball rankings.
That wasn’t the case for two college baseball publications. Baseball America dropped the Tigers four spots to No. 6, while Perfect Game bumped Clemson all the way to No. 8, a six-spot slide. Curiously, Baseball America and Perfect Game have the Tigers below the Georgia Bulldogs (35-11) in their new rankings.
That’s in spite of the fact that Clemson actually defeated Georgia, 3-0, on Wednesday and held the Bulldogs’ high-powered offense to three hits. UGA leads all of NCAA baseball in home runs with 112 through 46 games but against Clemson, they got a runner past second base only twice in nine innings at Doug Kingsmore Stadium.
Yet Baseball America has Georgia at No. 4 in its new rankings while Perfect Game puts them at No. 3, five whole spots ahead of the Tigers. While Clemson was swept at NC State, Georgia also struggled to win two of three against an Oklahoma Sooners team that barely cracks the Top 25 (No. 24) in Perfect Game’s own rankings.
The discourse over the significance of midweek results — and Top 25 polls themselves — is an ongoing matter during every baseball season. But putting Georgia ahead of Clemson in the rankings so soon after what happened on the field, in an actual head-to-head matchup of top five teams, seems a bit head-scratching.
Clemson baseball schedule 2025
Clemson heads to Tallahassee to face No. 8 Florida State (31-9, 12-6) in weekend series play beginning Friday at 6 p.m. ET. The game can be seen/streamed on ACC Network Extra. Saturday’s game will be televised nationally on ACC Network at 6 p.m.
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