Vanderbilt received its third preseason top-five ranking this week as D1Baseball placed the Commodores third in its Top 25 rankings.

Vanderbilt was among six teams from the Southeastern Conference in top 10 while the SEC led all conferences with eight teams in the rankings. The Commodores are joined by Arkansas (No. 2), Mississippi State (No. 4), Ole Miss (No. 5), LSU (No. 8), Florida (No. 9), Georgia (No. 16) and Tennessee (No. 19).

Vanderbilt registered a 49-18 record across the 2021 campaign, culminating in the program’s fifth trip to the College World Series while closing out the season as the national runner-up. Despite losing six MLB Draft selections, including a national-best two top-10 picks from last year’s team, the Commodores return four players who were ranked among D1Baseball’s 2022 Top 100 MLB Draft Prospects – Carter Young (No. 25), Spencer Jones (No. 60), Dominic Keegan (No. 66) and Nick Maldonado (No. 74).

Vanderbilt is set to open the 2022 season Feb. 18 when the Commodores welcome Oklahoma State, who were ranked seventh in D1Baseball’s preseason poll, to Hawkins Field for a three-game weekend series.