Tag: NCAA Regional

Check out these images from Texas’ 12-5 win over Louisiana

Texas took down ULL on Friday night, check out these images of the game.

On Friday night the Texas Longhorns were set to play the Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns for the second straight year in NCAA regional play. Last season the Horns were victorious 4-2 in the Coral Gables Regional before playing host Miami twice to move on to the Super Regionals.

That could be the case again as they will play host Texas A&M on Saturday night in this year’s edition.

Before they could focus on their biggest in-state rivals, Texas needed to take care of business against Louisiana. After three innings the Horns offense looked like they were going through the motions before breaking through in the fourth and fifth innings.

Infielder Dee Kennedy put Texas on top of Louisiana with a single that brought in two runs to give them the 3-2 lead. The Longhorns wouldn’t look back in the 12-5 win over the Ragin’ Cajuns. After building the 6-2 lead in the top of fifth, shortstop Jalin Flores put the exclamation point on the game with his third grand slam of the year.

The Longhorns will get the chance at retribution on Saturday night when they face off with the Aggies. Texas lost 9-2 to A&M back in March at the Disch. Turnabout could be fair play for the Horns. Just a preview of what is to come then they join the SEC in the 2024-25 calendar year.

Before Saturday’s game, here are the best images of Friday night’s win.

Duke baseball projected to host a regional, per D1Baseball

D1Baseball shared a 64-team bracket projection on Wednesday, and the Blue Devils snuck in as one of the last regional hosts.

If the college baseball season ended this week, D1Baseball thinks there’d be regional action in Durham.

In the last 64-team projection shared on Wednesday, the popular baseball site slotted Duke in as the 13th overall seed. The top 16 teams in the field host four-team regional tournaments, a double-elimination bracket with the winner advancing to a best-of-three super regional series.

The Blue Devils currently sit inside the top 10 on both the USA TODAY Sports Baseball Coaches Poll and the D1Baseball Top 25, but a 14-10 record in conference play could limit Duke from moving into the highest spots. A Tuesday win over No. 6 East Carolina, however, might change the math, as could a series victory over No. 11 North Carolina next weekend.

D1Baseball projected UC Irvine, Florida, and Columbia as the second, third, and fourth seed in the hypothetical Durham Region. The Gators offer a scare, as they made the College World Series just last year, and No. 16 UC Irvine is 34-10 on the season.

The winner of the Durham Region, in the proposed bracket, would face the winner of the Clemson Region, hosted by the Clemson Tigers.

The Fayetteville regional won’t be easy and DVH knows it

Dave Van Horn knows it will be a dogfight to win the Fayetteville Regional.

Fans in Fayetteville are excited about Baum-Walker Stadium being one of the NCAA Regional host locations. Still, manager Dave Van Horn already knows it won’t be easy. 

Van Horn spoke of the journey his team took to be one of the top eight teams despite the struggles they went through midway through the season, including injuries and one-inning collapses.

But the legendary manager quickly dismissed the season’s misfortunes and acknowledged the field. The Hogs start with the lowest seed of the group, Santa Clara, and while they might not be from a power five conference, Van Horn still respects them as champions.

“They won something,” he said after the selection. “They’re a championship team. So all I know is probably just a little bit more than most people know about them, what popped up on the board. We’ll look into them right now.”

The other side of the field includes one of the Diamond Hogs’ opponents from earlier in the season, another conference champion, TCU. The Horned Frogs blew out the Hogs at the College Baseball Classic, and they haven’t slowed down since then.

“What a really talented team,” Van Horn said about TCU. “Older team Veteran team. Good mix of speed and defense. Power. Just following scores, and I follow most of the teams in our region. We felt like we’d get somebody from the area. Wasn’t sure it would be TCU.”

The Hogs will have to wait to see if they will get a rematch, all pending on if TCU can defeat Arizona, the wild card of the bunch.

Both games are Friday, with the Hogs taking on Santa Clara first at 2 p.m.

Auburn gymnastics to host NCAA regional round

Auburn will face off against Kentucky, Georgia and Southern Utah in the first round.

The Auburn Tigers won’t have to travel far too start their gymnastics postseason run.

Auburn’s NCAA postseason bid has been confirmed, and it will host its own regional at the Neville Arena from March 30 to April 2. Uniquely, the Tigers will be the No. 2 seed when they compete in their own house — the No. 1 seed goes to the regular season and postseason-SEC champion Florida Gators.

In the first round, Auburn will see competition from SEC rivals Kentucky and Georgia along with the Southern Utah Thunderbirds. Florida, meanwhile, will face off against Denver, Ohio State and the winner of a play-in dual meet between Western Michigan and Iowa State.

The best two teams from those sessions will convene to gymnastics’ Sweet Sixteen round, and the top two teams from that session will then go on to the NCAA Championships in Fort Worth, Texas, at the end of April.

Auburn should serve to be a formidable opponent in its initial regional bracket. The Tigers have defeated the Georgia Bulldogs three times this year and the Kentucky Wildcats twice. Auburn has yet to face off against the Denver Pioneers this year, but they finished second in the Big 12 Championships and have been a notable gymnastics program for some time.

The Tigers will kick off the action on March 30 at 1 p.m. CT.

 

PK Park is selected as one of the 16 regional sites for the NCAA baseball tournament

Oregon’s great season was rewarded Sunday night as the NCAA announced that Eugene would be an NCAA regional site for the baseball tournament.

Well, there it is.

After some speculation, the NCAA made it official by announcing that PK Park would be one of the 16 host sites for the regionals round of the NCAA tournament. Oregon baseball hasn’t hosted a regional since the 2013 season.

Who the other three teams are that will join the Ducks in Eugene to play for a trip to the Super Regional won’t be known until Monday morning when the NCAA announces the seedings. Arizona and Stanford were also named as regional sites.

But just getting to the tournament, let alone hosting a regional is quite the accomplishment for Mark Wasikowski in his first full season as the Duck coach. When he arrived on the scene, the Oregon program was in disarray as the Ducks went 27-29 overall, but just 10-19 in Pac-12 play in George Horton’s final season.

The Ducks played just 15 games in 2020 before the pandemic hit, so who knows where that team would have ended up at. But in 2021, Wasikowski turned Oregon around and nearly won the Pac-12 title, going 20-10 in conference action, just one game behind Arizona, and 37-14 overall.

Everyone will find out who will be going where Monday at 9 a.m. on ESPN2 when they televise the NCAA baseball selection show. In order for the Ducks to be a possible Super Regional site, Oregon will have to be one of the Top 8 seeds in the tournament field.