The 64-team NCAA baseball tournament field was announced Monday. Here’s what you need to know:
- The 16 Regionals will feature four-team, double-elimination competitions, which will be played this weekend.
- The Regional winners advance to the Super Regionals, which will be played June 9-12.
- The eight Super Regional winners advance to the College World Series in Omaha, Neb., beginning June 16.
- The CWS championship series begins June 24.
Who are the regional hosts?
The 16 Regional hosts are Alabama, Arkansas, Auburn, Clemson, Coastal Carolina, Florida, Indiana State, Kentucky, LSU, Miami, Oklahoma State, South Carolina, Stanford, Vanderbilt, Virginia and Wake Forest.
🚨BREAKING 🚨
The Top 4 Seeds in Alphabetical Order!@RazorbackBSB@ClemsonBaseball@GatorsBB@WakeBaseball#RoadToOmaha pic.twitter.com/Vd3mBhMLrC
— NCAA Baseball (@NCAABaseball) May 29, 2023
Who are the top 8 seeds?
The eight national seeds are Wake Forest, Florida, Arkansas, Clemson, LSU, Vanderbilt, Virginia and Stanford. If they advance this weekend, they will host Super Regionals.
Who are the favorites?
According to DraftKings, Wake Forest and LSU are the favorites to win the national title, at plus-425 and plus-750, respectively.
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Wake Forest’s pitching staff is ridiculous and deep, led by Rhett Lowder, who is 13-0 with a 1.69 ERA. Josh Hartle is 9-2 with a 2.63 ERA, while Sean Sullivan is 5-3 with a 2.75 ERA and Seth Keener is 6-1 with a 2.50 ERA.
LSU has the likely No. 1 pick on the deep roster in Dylan Crews, and the Tigers were the early clear favorites this season to win a national title. The talent is certainly there to get it done with Paul Skenes leading the Tigers’ pitching staff. — Shirley
GO DEEPER
NCAA tournament scores and schedule
Toughest Regional
The Clemson Regional will be a serious battle. Clemson, the No. 4 overall seed, is the hottest team in the country, having won 16 straight games. Tennessee had its struggles this year, especially on the road (5-14 away from Lindsey Nelson Stadium), but this is a very good team with elite talent on the mound and a lineup that can score runs in bunches.
Charlotte, the No. 3 seed, has the nation’s leader in home runs with 30. Lipscomb won the A-SUN regular season by three games. — Light
Best storyline
Can Wake Forest buck the trend and become the first No. 1 overall seed to win the national title since Miami in 1999. The Demon Deacons had a magical 2023 season, winning every weekend series en route to a 47-10 record. They have talent on the mound — lead the nation with a 2.82 ERA — and a powerful lineup that features two players with at least 23 home runs.
But this is a program that is not used to being on the national stage. The Deacs will be expected to win their Regional. They will be expected to win their Super Regional. How will they deal with the pressure? The college baseball landscape is littered with elite teams that have failed to live up to expectations — Tennessee in 2022 and Arkansas in 2021, to name a few recent examples. — Light
Texas teams face difficult road
Four teams from the state of Texas have made 14 appearances in the eight College World Series since 2014. The previous postseason, in 2013, marked the most recent year that no team from Texas was selected as a Regional host — until this season. And the committee is sending the four Big 12 teams from the Lone Star State on arduous journeys in Regional play.
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Texas, which advanced to the CWS in 2021 and 2022, is set to face Louisiana in the first round at No. 9 Miami. Texas A&M will play Cal State Fullerton in the first round at No. 8 Stanford. TCU is headed to the home of No. 3 Arkansas to face Arizona in the opening round. And Texas Tech will open against UConn at No. 2 Florida.
Also from Texas, Dallas Baptist is headed to No. 11 Oklahoma to face Washington, and Sam Houston will play Oregon State at No. 5 LSU. — Sherman
Tournament dark horses
Oral Roberts is riding an 18-game winning streak, the longest in Division I. It will play at Oklahoma State in the opening round, an unfortunate matchup for the host Cowboys. The Golden Eagles, 46-11, in their 30th NCAA postseason, beat Oklahoma State in both of their regular-season meetings this year — April 11 in Stillwater, 8-5, and May 2 in Tulsa, 9-7.
The winner of the Stillwater Regional will face the winner of the Nashville Regional, hosted by No. 6 seed Vanderbilt. Oral Roberts has advanced once to the CWS, winning one game in Omaha in 1978. — Sherman
Maryland was going to be the pick — the Terps recovered from a slow start to win both the Big Ten regular-season and tournament titles — but I can’t see them getting out of the Winston-Salem Regional. So I will go with Campbell as a No. 2 seed that could not only win its Regional but possibly make it to Omaha. This is a program that has been known for its pitching in recent years, but the Fighting Camels are second nationally in runs scored (558) and slugging (.566), fifth in home runs (116) and 11th in average (.318). It wouldn’t be surprising at all to see them emerge from the Columbia Regional. — Light
What a run
Tulane enters the postseason at 19-40. It won four games in six days as the No. 7 seed at the AAC Conference tournament to earn a regional bid for the first time since 2016. The reward for Green Wave after their unlikely run in Clearwater, Fla.? A short trip to Baton Rouge to face No. 5 LSU in the Regional opener for both Louisiana programs.
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Tulane beat Houston, the second seed in the league tourney, to open play Tuesday, followed by a win against Memphis, a split with Houston to reach the championship and an 8-6 victory against top-seeded East Carolina on Sunday. Tulane played LSU once in the regular season, an 11-5 win for the Tigers in New Orleans on April 11. At the time, LSU, ranked No. 1, improved to 27-5. Tulane dropped to 9-24. — Sherman
Required reading
- The rise of Wake Forest baseball: Culture, talent, technology … and a bit of luck
- A weekend at-bat with a generational talent and MLB’s likely No. 1 draft pick
- Erik Bakich’s return to Clemson reunites Tigers’ baseball family
(Photo of Rhett Lowder: Ben McKeown / AP Photo)