'We beat the best teams': Nick Mingione makes NCAA Tournament case

Kentucky is now playing the waiting game after going one-and-done in the SEC Tournament. Many believe the Bat Cats are on the NCAA Tournament bubble. Nick Mingione isn’t one of those people. The UK head coach believes his 10th team in Lexington deserves to be in the field of 64.

Mingione made his case for Kentucky’s at-large bid in his postgame game press conference at the Hoover Met following the 8-5 loss to Vanderbilt.

“We beat the best teams. If you look at our resumé,” Mingione said. “In order to be considered one of the best teams, you have to beat them. There’s all kinds of numbers. I can spit them out.”

The metrics back up Mingione’s case. Kentucky is No. 37 in RPI and No. 31 in Diamond Sports Ranking (DSR). UK’s losses have piled up in conference play but the wins standout. The Bat Cats simply have more quality wins than every other team on the bubble. Adding that with strong metrics could be enough to get an invite to the tournament.

“Baseball has a way to just punch you in the gut. And all wins and losses are not created equally,” Mingione explained. “That’s why I appreciate the DSR. We have an awesome score there. You look at our RPI, we’re in great shape there. You look at our KPI. We’re in great shape there.”

Mingione also went on to point out that Kentucky, Georgia, and Texas A&M were the only teams in the SEC to beat everyone on their schedule. UK has the 10th most wins against top-30 RPI teams with 10 plus a winning record (5-4) against projected national hosts. There are plenty of good marks on the resume.

Kentucky is currently 6-6 in Quad 1, 5-7 in Quad 2, and a combined 20-8 in Quad 3 and 4. This baseball team owns five top-10 wins and a top-15 non-conference RPI. The 2-8 series record in SEC play isn’t great but the quality wins obviously standout and could help separate UK from the rest of the field.

Nick Mingione believes his team should receive an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament on Monday.