Niner Nuggets- Week 9

Charlotte finished the week a perfect 4-0, beating Winthrop at home before travelling to Houston to grab a 3 game sweep over Rice. That pushes the Niners to 19-15, and 9-5 in Conference USA. At the halway point in conference play, the Niners it in 3rd place.

Charlotte returns to NC this week for 5 games including a trip to Chapel Hill, hosting ECU in uptown, and hosting UAB at the Hayes this weekend.
Before we jump into rankings, standings, and RPI, we should acknowledge that Wyatt Hudepohl was named C-USA Pitcher of the Week this week after his stellar performance on Friday in a 1-0 win at Rice.

From C-USA, UTSA jumped back into the national rankings this week, and Dallas Baptist is now ranked. Here’s a look at the national rankings for our teams of interest this week:

D1 Baseball– 6 South Carolina; 7 ECU; 10 Coastal Carolina; 18 UNC; 25 UTSA
Baseball America– 6 South Carolina; 7 ECU; 8 Coastal Carolina; 17 UNC; 21 DBU; 24 UTSA
USA Today Coaches Poll– 6 South Carolina; 8 ECU; 13 CCU; 16 UNC; RV: DBU. UTSA, UNCW, VT

Charlotte has currently played the toughest schedule in Conference USA based on Strength of Schedule, where the Niners currently rank 20th in the country. The OOC SOS is at #7 in the country.
The RPI has CLT climbing to 52 this week, up a few spots from last week. We use Warren Nolan as our source for RPI data and overall Conference USA is rated 7th with a record of 118-93 out of conference. Conference USA now has only four teams in the RPI Top 100 (UTSA, DBU, CLT, FAU).

After a sweep this weekend, CLT finds themselves 3 games out of 1st place in C-USA with 15 games remaining. UTSA, & DBU are looking to pull away and CLT, LT, & FAU are looking to make up ground. FIU, UAB, and WKU are fighting to stay in the Top 8 in order to qualify for the C-USA Tournament in Houston. Here is how Conference USA stands and what remains half way through conference play,

As of now, the 49ers only have 5 non-conference games remaining, and 4 of those teams are currently ranked. Out of conference, the Niners have only played 2 teams with a losing record. Here’s a look at how the non-conference opponent are doing.