SEC Baseball Tournament 2023: Thursday Schedule and Bracket Predictions

The SEC baseball tournament continues Thursday with a couple of marquee matchups in the form of LSU Tigers vs. Arkansas Razorbacks, and Vanderbilt Commodores vs. Florida Gators.

Both games could provide fans of the Southeast Conference a preview of teams that will compete in the finals of the tournament, particularly in the case of LSU and Florida, both of whom have looked better than the rest of the field to this point.

Find out the schedule for Thursday's play and take a deeper look at the Tigers team as they pursue an SEC Championship with this preview of the next round of competition.

Thursday Schedule and Predictions

The schedule for Thursday's SEC Tournament play is as follows (all times ET):

• No. 6 South Carolina vs. No. 10 Texas A&M (10:30 a.m., SEC Network) (Prediction: South Carolina)
• No. 9 Alabama vs.  No. 5 Auburn (2:00 p.m., SEC Network) (Prediction: Auburn)
• No. 2 Arkansas vs. No. 3 LSU (5:30 p.m., SEC Network) (Prediction: LSU)
• No. 1 Florida vs. No. 4 Vanderbilt (9:00 p.m., SEC Network) (Prediction: Florida)

Can LSU Power Its Way to SEC Championship?

The LSU Tigers may be the No. 3 seed in this year's tournament, but they are every bit as dangerous as any team remaining.

The team currently boasts a .566 SLG percentage and has blasted a total of 116 home runs while reaching base nearly 44 percent of the time. Wednesday, it sent a message to the rest of the field by way of a decisive and dominant 10-3 victory over South Carolina.

The offense recorded 12 hits and seven walks, battering the Gamecocks at the plate.

They will look to build on that momentum when they take on second-seeded Arkansas in what has the potential to be one of the marquee matches of the tournament to this point.

It was not just the Tigers' offense that came alive in the win over South Carolina, though, as its pitchers struck out 10 while giving up five hits and walking six.

Six of those strikeouts came from Nate Ackenhouse, who retired six batters en route to the second save of his season.

The win was head coach Jay Johnson's 400th and moved the Tigers closer to achieving their goal of an SEC Championship.

Their opponents Thursday, the Arkansas Razorbacks, are fresh off an extra-innings win over Texas A&M that ended with a 398-foot blast from designated hitter Kendall Diggs.

Arkansas came back from a 4-1 deficit in Wednesday's game, proving its resiliency. It will need that in ample amounts if it hopes to quiet the Tigers' bats and keep the score close enough to strike in dramatic fashion again.

It will be a tough task, especially if the Tigers get the support from the mound that they did Wednesday. If they continue to do so, LSU will be competing for the tournament win and a potential NCAA World Series victory.