survey says …

If sports polls are a show of respect, then Mississippi baseball is getting plenty of it. Mississippi State is ranked No. 2 and Ole Miss No. 4 in Baseball America’s NCAA Division I poll, and both schools are in the top 10 in just about every other D-I ranking. Jackson State, off to a 6-0 start in SWAC play, is ranked No. 1 in the Black College Nines HBCU Top 10. Pearl River Community College is No. 2 in the NJCAA’s Division II poll, and three other state jucos are also ranked, including East Central (which is No. 16 despite leading the MACCC standings with a 13-3 record). William Carey is No. 14 in the current NAIA poll and shouldn’t lose much ground after going 1-2 at No. 6 Faulkner last weekend, dropping the rubber game 6-5 in 10 innings. Belhaven, 13-5 and 8-1 in the American Southwest Conference, got votes in this week’s d3baseball.com Top 25 poll. (Note: There are 389 D-III baseball schools vying for attention.) And then there’s the high school ranks, where Madison Central has risen to No. 4 in the MaxPreps Top 25. The Jaguars, led by Stanford signee Braden Montgomery and State signee Hunter Hines, are 14-0 and have won by such scores as 20-2, 21-5, 16-0, 15-1, 15-3 and 13-1.