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The Road to Omaha: The 2022 NCAA Tournament Thread


Seadragon76

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It's that time again, everyone. The Road to Omaha is about to start... first off, the 16 regional sites for the first weekend of play. They are, in alphabetical order...

 

-Auburn

-East Carolina

-Florida

-Georgia Southern

-Louisville

-Maryland

-Miami (Florida)

-North Carolina

-Oklahoma State

-Oregon State

-Stanford

-Southern Mississippi

-Tennessee

-Texas

-Texas A&M

-Virginia Tech

 

By being named hosts, these 16 teams have earned a trip to the tournament. The main field will be unveiled tomorrow.

 

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The bracket has been unveiled.

 

For those new to this thread, here's how it works: There are 16 regions with 4 teams in each one playing this weekend. The top seeds in each region have a national seed, 1 through 16. Having the top eight seeds is very important as that means you will host both the Regional and the Super Regional.

 

The national seeds are, as follows...

 

1. Tennessee

2. Stanford

3. Oregon State

4. Virginia Tech

5. Texas A&M

6. Miami (Florida)

7. Oklahoma State

8. East Carolina

9. Texas

10. North Carolina

11. Southern Mississippi

12. Louisville

13. Florida

14. Auburn

15. Maryland

16. Georgia Southern

 

Now, the regional pairings...

 

Super Region #1 - Knoxville vs. Statesboro

Knoxville: Tennessee, Georgia Tech, Campbell, Alabama State

Statesboro: Georgia Southern, Notre Dame, Texas Tech, UNC Greensboro

 

Super Region #2 - Austin vs. Greenville

Austin: Texas, Louisiana Tech, Dallas Baptist, Air Force

Greenville: East Carolina, Virginia, Coastal Carolina, Coppin State

 

Super Region #3 - College Station vs. Louisville

College Station: Texas A&M, TCU, UL Lafayette, Oral Roberts

Louisville: Louisville, Oregon, Michigan, SE Missouri State

 

Super Region #4 - Gainesville vs. Blacksburg

Gainesville: Florida, Oklahoma, Liberty, Central Michigan

Blacksburg: Virginia Tech, Gonzaga, Columbia, Wright State

 

Super Region #5 - Stanford vs. College Park

Stanford: Stanford, Texas State, UC Santa Barbara, Binghamton

College Park: Maryland, Wake Forest, UConn, Long Island

 

Super Region #6 - Chapel Hill vs. Stillwater

Chapel Hill: North Carolina, Georgia, Virginia Commonwealth, Hofstra

Stillwater: Oklahoma State, Arkansas, Grand Canyon, Missouri State

 

Super Region #7 - Coral Gables vs Hattiesburg

Coral Gables: Miami (Florida), Arizona, Mississippi, Canisius

Hattiesburg: Southern Mississippi, Louisiana State, Kennesaw State, Army

 

Super Region #8 - Auburn vs. Corvallis

Auburn: Auburn, UCLA, Florida State, SE Louisiana

Corvallis: Oregon State, Vanderbilt, San Diego, New Mexico State

 

A few notes here..

-Two first timers in Coppin State and Hofstra. Air Force is in for the first time since 1969.

-Coppin State is also one of three teams with losing records in the field. The other two are Binghamton and New Mexico State

-The last four were Florida State, Grand Canyon, Liberty and Mississippi. The first four out were North Carolina State, Old Dominion, Rutgers and Wofford.

 

TV wise, all the games will be on ESPN+, but there will be a few games on Day 1 that will be televised.

 

ESPN2 - Florida State vs. UCLA (Auburn Regional)

ESPNU - UConn vs. Wake Forest (College Park Regional); San Diego vs. Vanderbilt (Corvallis Regional); Mississippi vs. Arizona (Coral Gables Regional); New Mexico State vs. Oregon State (Corvallis Regional)

ACC Network - Texas Tech vs. Notre Dame (Statesboro Regional); Wright State vs. Virginia Tech (Blacksburg Regional)

SEC Network - Grand Canyon vs. Arkansas (Stillwater Regional); Alabama State vs. Tennessee (Knoxville Regional)

Longhorn Network - Air Force vs. Texas (Austin Regional)

 

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Day 1 is in the books, so let's recap what happened...

 

Dominate Top Seeds - For the most part, the top seeds in each regional held up their end of the deal as they mostly dominated their games with the lower seeds with Maryland providing the biggest beating of the day in a 23-2 massacre of Long Island, thanks in part to a 9 run showing in the 2nd inning. In fact, the closet any 4 seed got was 1 run: New Mexico State lost on a walk off walk against Oregon State

 

Comeback Kings - LSU was down 11-4 in the bottom of the 8th against Kennesaw State. What the Tigers did was something out of a Hollywood movie: a 10 run inning to take a 14-11 lead on the Atlantic Sun tournament champion Owls. That would be the final score, by the way.

 

Weather Woes - Bad weather shoved the games in Coral Gables back a day while an extremely long delay pushed the game between UNC Greensboro and Georgia Southern to this morning.

 

As for televised games...

 

ESPN - Oregon vs. SE Missouri State (Louisville Regional - Elimination Game)

ESPN2 - UCLA vs. SE Louisiana (Auburn Regional - Elimination Game); Louisville vs. Michigan (Louisville Regional - Winner's Bracket Game); Auburn vs. Florida State (Auburn Regional - Winner's Bracket Game); Oregon State vs. San Diego (Corvallis Regional - Winner's Bracket Game)

ESPNU - Wake Forest vs. LIU (College Park Regional - Elimination Game); Vanderbilt vs. New Mexico State (Corvallis Regional - Elimination Game); Oklahoma vs. Florida (Gainesville Regional - Winner's Bracket Game); Stanford vs. Texas State (Stanford Regional - Winner's Bracket Game)

ACC Network - Georgia Tech vs. Alabama State (Knoxville Regional - Elimination Game); East Carolina vs. Virginia (Greenville Regional - Winner's Bracket Game)

SEC Network - Georgia vs. Hofstra (Chapel Hill Regional - Elimination Game); Tennessee vs. Campbell (Knoxville Regional - Winner's Bracket Game)

Longhorn Network - Texas vs. Louisiana Tech (Austin Regional - Winner's Bracket Game)

 

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Day 2 is in the books... let's have a recap.

 

Angry, Angry Teams - The SEC always seems to have the strongest teams in college baseball and if yesterday was anything to go by, then making either Georgia or Vanderbilt mad would an extremely bad move. The Bulldogs destroyed Hofstra 24-1 in Chapel Hill while Vanderbilt, still stinging from their lackluster showing against San Diego in Corvallis, unleashed the dogs on New Mexico State in a 21-1 romp. They weren't the only teams to lay the lumber out as Auburn had a repeat of the night before and Virginia Tech showed off their dominance over Columbia.

 

The Fallen Fifteen - On the first day of eliminations, 15 teams were knocked out. Of those teams, 12 of them were 4 seeds with the only 3 seeds knocked out being Liberty, Grand Canyon (two of the last four teams in, BTW) and Dallas Baptist. Also... how pathetic was UNC Greensboro yesterday? Two games, no runs. They are easily the worst team in field, bar none.

 

Underdogs and Rams - Three 3 seeds are a win away from the Super Regional round as UConn knocked off Maryland with a 10-5 victory,  VCU is a win away from winning the Chapel Hill Regional after a hard fought 4-3 win over North Carolina and Michigan took down Louisville in that regional. Outside of them, there are four 2 seeds that is a win away from advancing (Texas State, LSU, Arkansas, and Notre Dame) and the rest are 1 seeds.

 

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5 hours ago, EskimoAldus said:

Stanford walked it off against Texas State and is on to Omaha. 

 

Not yet, speedy. There's still the Super Regionals this upcoming weekend.

 

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3 hours ago, Seadragon76 said:

 

Not yet, speedy. There's still the Super Regionals this upcoming weekend.

 

That's right. I jumped the gun on that. My bad. 

 

Super Regional winner picks:

 

Tennessee

Texas

Louisville

Oklahoma 

Stanford

Arkansas 

Southern Miss

Oregon State

 

 

 

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Super Regionals are now set...

 

Friday-Saturday-Sunday (if necessary)

 

Notre Dame vs. (1) Tennessee - Notre Dame got an unlucky draw heading down to Statesboro and winning that region running away. It's a gift for the Irish... but now comes a bigger challenge in the form of the top overall seed in the Volunteers. Tennessee had little to no issues in their regional as they swatted down all three teams to earn hosting duties this weekend.

 

(9) Texas vs. (8) East Carolina - Both teams showed their best stuff over the weekend as Texas stormed their way through their regional while ECU had a scare from Coastal Carolina, only to slap the Chanticleers back down to earth. Now, the Pirates get ready to host one of college baseball's biggest names in Texas.

 

(12) Louisville vs. (5) Texas A&M - Texas A&M had no problems blazing their way on their home field last weekend. Something that Louisville couldn't say... the Cardinals got popped by Michigan and then went on a roaring rampage of revenge against the Wolverines in taking both games from them to the tune of 31-10. Now the Cardinals have an even tougher task awaiting them.

 

Oklahoma vs. (4) Virginia Tech - One of the great stories of the season has been the rise of Virginia Tech from habitual middle of the pack team to national power. The Hokies blasted their way through their home regional with back-to-back wins over Ivy League champion Columbia. Next up for the Hokies is upset minded Oklahoma. The Sooners went to Florida and stunned the seeded Gators to take the regional.

 

Saturday-Sunday-Monday (if necessary)

 

UConn vs. (2) Stanford - UConn might be the Cinderella of this ball. The Huskies survived in College Park against a very good Maryland team. Now, they head west to face a Stanford team that was tested by Texas State, but survived on a walk off to move on.

 

Arkansas vs. (10) North Carolina - If offense is your thing, then this match-up should be right up your alley. North Carolina had two games in their home regional where they dropped 15+ runs on their hapless foes (15 on Hofstra and 19 against VCU) while Arkansas was the survivor of the Stillwater Fireworks Show in what was the 2nd lowest combined score out there (the lowest was Arkansas' 7-1 opening win against Grand Canyon).

 

Mississippi vs. (11) Southern Mississippi - In a showdown for Magnolia State supremacy, the Rebels and Golden Eagles meet in Hattiesburg. Ole Miss had no issues in Coral Gables, winning twice against Arizona (the second win coming in a 22-6 smashing of the Wildcats) while Southern Miss had to do things the hard way at home after losing to LSU. They held off a very game Kennesaw State team in the 2nd elimination game... and then the Golden Eagles won both games with the Tigers to earn this trip.

 

(14) Auburn vs. (3) Oregon State - Auburn felt like the school bully at their home regional as they won all three of their games by an average margin of 11 runs. Now the bully has to take on someone their own size in Oregon State, who held off the Vandy Boys in a winner takes all clash.

 

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10 hours ago, Seadragon76 said:

Notre Dame vs. (1) Tennessee - Notre Dame got a lucky draw heading down to Statesboro and winning that region running away. It's a nice gift for the Irish... but now comes a bigger challenge in the form of the top overall seed in the Volunteers. Tennessee had little to no issues in their regional as they swatted down all three teams to earn hosting duties this weekend.

There's a lot of ways you could describe Notre Dame's draw, but I wouldn't use "lucky" or "a nice gift" in a million years. Pretty much everyone expected ND to be of the 16 national seeds easily and had them in contention to be one of the last top-8 seeds (and be in line to host a Super) — having to travel in the first place was bad enough; going from a potential Super host to having to go through Tennessee is even worse.

 

I would like to think ND will strengthen its non-conference schedule after two straight years ND's gotten the shaft by the committee, but it's wildly frustrating because northern schools generally don't get too many chances at this. ND would've probably beaten any top-8 other than Mississippi State last year with how well they were playing in the tournament, and I fear we may end up saying the same thing after this weekend.

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We have our eight teams, let's see who is going to Omaha...

 

Friday

 

Oklahoma vs. (5) Texas A&M - Former Big XII rivals (and future SEC rivals) meet in the first game in Omaha. The Aggies swept Louisville to get here while Oklahoma laid out Virginia Tech on their home field to reach Omaha.

 

Notre Dame vs. (9) Texas - The Fighting Irish delivered the biggest stunner of the season by taking 2 out of 3 games from top overall seed Tennessee on their home field - though it shouldn't be too much of a surprise considering the Irish were a win away from going to Omaha last season. They'll face a Texas team that braved a nasty weather delay to hammer East Carolina on their home field.

 

Saturday

 

Arkansas vs. (2) Stanford  - As the highest seed left in the tournament, the Cardinal might be the odds on favorite to win in Omaha. This is despite a big time scare from UConn in their Super Regional. They'll face an Arkansas team that swept North Carolina in low scoring affairs that were extremely different from the fireworks show they were in.

 

Mississippi vs. (14) Auburn - It's an all SEC clash as the Rebels, coming off a masterful showing against in-state rival Southern Miss, taking on the Tigers from Auburn. They won two games in Corvallis to get here.

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

I'm pretty conflicted with college baseball right now.

 

The CWS just felt off, bunch of blowouts and a team that went under .500 in conference winning it all. Feels cheap. 

 

Then, the tournament selection process is a joke. RPI is not good ranking system for college baseball as teams like GCU and DBU can throw their studs in mid week games against big programs and win but not care about the weekend games to manipulate the ranking.

 

And, there's too many auto bids to make the tournament. So many schools I've never heard of making the tournament and getting blown out in the regionals. I want a team like Cal Poly in there that have two All-Americans and could make some noise over a team like Binghamton who got absolutely destroyed in the regionals. But I know if they took those auto bids away the NCAA would just let in even more teams from the SEC and boom a team like Ole Miss wins the CWS because they got hot. 

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