The ScoutConnect staff is once again updating our IHSA ‘Large School’ – 3A & 4A – team rankings with the sixth week of Illinois high school baseball season under our belt. 

It’s a relatively quiet week on our top-10, with minimal movement, and only one new team debuting. Regardless, we’ve broken down what our fresh rankings look like below, and highlighted three teams that are on the outside looking in, though playing well. 

As a reminder, teams taken into consideration are those that fall into our ‘Coverage Map’, which includes all of Southern Illinois, the Metro East area, Springfield, and up as high as Mt. Zion. This does not mean that our staff won’t provide coverage to all areas of the state, as well as Missouri, but for team rankings purposes, we will stick to all teams in 3A and 4A that fall underneath the Mt. Zion line.

THE TOP 10…

+ Triad (17-3) maintains the top spot on our list despite scuffling a bit towards the latter half of the week. The Knights swept a Mississippi Valley Conference set against a scrappy, competitive Waterloo (15-5, 1-0) club that was on these rankings last week. They traveled down to Paducah, KY, to play three games against a cross-state opponent. The Knights dropped games to two of the top teams in the ‘Bluegrass State’, falling to McCracken County (5-1) on Friday and Trinity (4-2) on Saturday, with a win over Carlisle County (2-1) sandwiched between the two. Triad has not lost a game to an opponent in Illinois this year. 

+ Winners of four straight, Edwardsville (11-6) is on the rise, jumping up one spot after a 3-0 week, and now sitting at second on our board. The Tigers swept Collinsville (13-1, 1-0) in a Southwestern Conference set and took down a scrappy 2A Columbia (4-1) club on Friday night. Edwardsville has a challenging Southwestern Conference set against ranked Alton this upcoming week, starting on Tuesday. 

+ O’Fallon (14-4) falls to third in this update after dropping two games and winning one. They fell to Belleville West on the road on Tuesday, though they rallied on Thursday at home to even the conference series with a walk-off win. In between those games, the Panthers hosted Columbia, losing to the Eagles 2-1. They will matchup against ranked foe Belleville East this week in Southwestern Conference play. 

The next four teams on our rankings all stay put from where they were last week:

+ No. 4 Alton (13-7): Alton played ranked Belleville East tough, splitting the conference series with the Lancers with a 3-1 loss and 3-0 win at home. They hosted Highland at home on Friday and lost 7-5 to the Bulldogs, losing a lead late. They will matchup with No. 2 Edwardsville this upcoming week in conference play. 

+ No. 5 Mascoutah (11-5): The Indians split with Highland (7-0 W, 4-3 L) in Mississippi Valley conference play and beat Salem (8-2) on Saturday. They will play two conference games against Civic Memorial to start this week, with non-conference games against Greenville and Freeburg on the horizon. 

+ No. 6 Glenwood (10-4): The Titans won both of the games they played this week, defeating MacArthur (12-0) and Lanphier (11-0) rather handedly. Glenwood got their ace back in LHP Cam Appenzeller (2025; Tennessee commit), who will throw in a huge conference game against Rochester on Tuesday. 

+ No. 7 Mt. Zion (13-4): The Braves played three games last week, losing to Teutopolis (5-0), who’s one of the top 2A teams in the state, before turning around and sweeping Mattoon (12-4, 8-0) on Saturday morning. 

+ Winners of 10 straight, Marion (14-4) cracks these rankings for the first time, jumping in at No. 8 on our board. In that span, the Wildcats have picked up quality wins over Zeigler-Royalton (3-1), St. Anthony (5-4), and Jackson (MO), defeating conference foe Mt. Vernon twice, too. 

+ Rochester (15-5) and Belleville East (16-7) round out the last two spots on our top 10. The Rockets split with Sacred-Heart Griffin (11-3 W, 7-3 L) this week, beating Porta/Ashland (6-4) and Routt Catholic (5-1) with a loss to Eureka (6-1) on Saturday. The Lancers split their conference series with Alton (3-1 W, 3-0 L), beating Centralia (6-0) and losing to Father McGivney (12-1). 

+ Waterloo (11-6) falls out of our rankings after debuting for the first time last week. The Bulldogs lost both conference games to Triad (15-5, 1-0), but played the area’s top team fairly tough in game two, before picking up wins over Mt. Vernon (7-3) and Collinsville (12-8) to end the week. Even though they’re out of our rankings this week, this Waterloo team is a scrappy, competitive club that will be one to watch as the season progresses. 

NEXT UP…

+ Belleville West (11-7): The Maroons split their conference games with O’Fallon and beat Granite City on the week as well. They continue to play their own tough, competitive brand of baseball. 

+ Highland (10-6): As they’ve continued to do, the Bulldogs remain a tough out, splitting with Mascoutah (7-0 L, 4-3 W) while also beating Greenville (5-1) and Alton (7-5). LHP Chase Knebel (2025; SWIC) and RHP Braxdon Decker (2025; Eastern Illinois) continue to dominate on the mound for this club. 

+ Effingham (14-5): The Hearts have won nine of their last 10 games, including six straight. They will play Farina South Central on Wednesday of this week and have a conference double-header with Charleston on Saturday morning. 

Author: Diego