This marks the final baseball Diamond Power Rankings.
Each week, The Record tracked the pulse of San Joaquin County baseball and softball, ranking the top 10 teams on both diamonds as the landscape shifted throughout the season.
Now, with the regular season complete and the postseason underway, it’s time for the final edition.
To provide the full picture, rather than limiting this edition to just the top 10, all 29 county baseball teams are ranked. The same will be done for softball.
Using season results, here are the final rankings. Movement reflects changes from last week’s list, while teams featured in our inaugural top 10 include a look at where they were originally ranked.
Note: Team records reflect the end of the regular season and do not include postseason results.
1. St. Mary’s (—) (22-5) (TCAL) (First Ranking No. 1)
From Day 1, this was St. Mary’s spot to lose. Four losses in the first seven games might have raised eyebrows elsewhere, but not when all came against top-50 California teams. From there, the Rams ripped off 19 wins in their final 20, with the only setback coming against Orange Lutheran, the top-ranked team in the state, in the Boras Classic state championship. Back-to-back Boras Classic Northern Section Champions. Six straight TCAL titles. Back-to-back TCAL titles. Three Division I starting arms capable of no-hitters, perfect games and 15-strikeout nights. The most complete lineup in the Sac-Joaquin Section. St. Mary’s entered as the standard — and stayed there.
2. Manteca (—) (20-8) (VOL) (First Ranking No. 2)
Everything came down to the regular-season finale, and Manteca delivered. A 3-2 win over East Union on April 24 secured second place in the VOL, city bragging rights and the No. 2 spot in the power rankings. It was a fitting finish to a regular season that saw the Buffaloes return to California’s top 100 for the first time since 2013, the year the program won its first section title.
3. East Union (—) (19-8) (VOL) (First Ranking No. 3)
Third place in the VOL at 12-6 hardly tells the full story. East Union reached heights the program had never touched this season, climbing inside California’s top 125 after never previously cracking the top 250. A win over Central Catholic, the program’s first-ever three-game series victory over Oakdale and a school record for regular-season wins all make the case that this may be the best East Union team in program history.
4. Ripon Christian (↑1) (25-2) (TVL) (First Ranking No. 7)
The adjustment period didn’t last long. A season after joining the league, the Knights went 11-1 to capture their first TVL title, closed the regular season on a 16-game winning streak and entered the playoffs with the most wins in program history.
5. Oakdale (↓1) (18-9) (VOL) (First Ranking No. 4)
That is how unforgiving the VOL was this season. Oakdale finished 11-7 in league play, but in a race that tight, a 2-1 season-series loss to East Union was enough to separate third from fourth.
6. Lodi (—) (18-9) (TCAL) (NR)
Three consecutive seasons. Three runner-up finishes. Lodi once again found itself near the top of the TCAL, closing the regular season at 11-4.
7. Edison (↑1) (21-5) (SJAA) (First Ranking No. 6)
Eighty-five years. More than 20 years of losing seasons. Just two campaigns with seven or more wins in that entire span. Edison changed all of that this season, capturing the first league championship in program history with an SJAA title.
8. Lincoln (↓1) (14-13) (TCAL) (First Ranking No. 8)
One more win against Lodi, and maybe these two switch places. But after a blazing 9-0 TCAL start, followed by a 1-5 stretch against Lodi and St. Mary’s, Lincoln’s third-place finish keeps the Trojans exactly where they started.
9. Escalon (NR) (18-8) (TVL) (First Ranking No. 10)
Recency bias was never supposed to be part of the equation. Then Escalon forced the conversation. The No. 9 seed opened the playoffs with a road win over the No. 8 seed, then stunned Division V’s No. 1 seed — a top-100 California team — in the quarterfinals. But maybe none of it should be that surprising. Escalon was the only TVL team to beat Ripon Christian during the regular season, and its fourth-place finish at 8-4 never fully reflected how dangerous this team could be.
10. Mountain House (↓1) (12-16) (VOL) (First Ranking No. 5)
Doubling the win total from a year ago should say plenty about Mountain House’s growth. Instead, the Mustangs became another example of how unforgiving the VOL was, going 8-2 in nonleague play before a brutal 4-14 run through league competition dropped them below .500.
11. Liberty Ranch (NR) (18-8) (SVC) (First Ranking No. 9)
Ask anyone around Liberty Ranch, and they would probably say the SVC title should have been theirs. The Hawks were the only team to hand first-place Bradshaw Christian a league loss, but defeats to third-place Amador and fifth-place El Dorado ultimately left Liberty Ranch at 11-3 and in second place.
12. Ripon (↓2) (17-9) (TVL) (NR)
The gap between Ripon and first place was thinner than it looked. Both matchups against Ripon Christian were decided by a single run, and the Indians also took two games from Escalon. Even without a league title, a 9-3 second-place finish in the TVL marked obvious progress for a program that won just 11 games last season.
13. Tokay (NR) (15-13) (SJAA) (NR)
Twelve seniors gone. Only four returning players. For many programs, that would mean a reset. Instead, Tokay repeated as SJAA champion and made it back-to-back league titles.
14. Sierra (11-17) (VOL)
15. Bear Creek (13-13-2) (SJAA)
16. Tracy (9-18) (TCAL)
17. Kimball (9-16) (TCAL)
18. Stagg (16-8-1) (SJAA)
19. River Island (14-7) (CCAAL)
20. Linden (15-11) (MLL)
21. Weston Ranch (11-14) (SJAA)
22. Franklin (9-15-1) (SJAA)
23. Millennium (7-13) (CCAAL)
24. Galt (6-16) (SVC)
25. Lathrop (7-17) (WAC)
26. Merrill West (2-25) (TCAL)
27. Venture Academy (4-13) (CCAAL)
28. McNair (5-16) (SJAA)
29. Chavez (4-17) (SJAA)
This article originally appeared on The Record: Final San Joaquin County baseball Diamond Power Rankings revealed
Reporting by Dylan Ackermann, The Stockton Record / The Record
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
