Strange regional

[roanoke]

Our #4 is Ohio State.

McNeese is 3 vs. Indiana State is #2.

There were much easier #4s available.

Not getting ahead of myself, but paired with #14 West Virginia who has Texas A& M in their bracket.

[commadore]

I thought so too until I started looking at their stats. I'll post those later, but key is that they have not played a top 25 RPI team and only 6 in the top 50. Still, they only have 2 hitters hitting over .300.

[Good2BGold]

Our #4 is Ohio State.

McNeese is 3 vs. Indiana State is #2.

There were much easier #4s available.

Not getting ahead of myself, but paired with #14 West Virginia who has Texas A& M in their bracket.

FYI, West Virginia is No. 15, but regarding Ohio State, as I understand it they were not going to make the NCAA tourney if they had not won the Big 10 tournament. One of the announcers in our game yesterday, referred to them as a bid stealer.

[roanoke]

Right & right.

They were a bid-stealer with questionable stats before the big ten tourney. But there are teams with losing records in this tournament & I am not sure why Georgia Tech got one while we got the hottest team in the big ten. Still- point taken. Not outrageous- just a little surprising.

WVU is 15 - but paired with us as the 2. They have one major stud pitcher...

[3Lines]

WVU is 15 - but paired with us as the 2. They have one major stud pitcher...

I'm not worried about West Virginia. I am worried about Texas A&M.

[Versus75]

West Virginia is among the weakest no. 1 seeds. Texas A&M among the best of the no. 2 seeds. Duke is no slouch,
One tough regional. If

[commadore]

So who do we start in game one? Do we go with Fellows or save him for the second day against (hopefully) the second best team in the region? Hickman has already beaten Indiana State. I will say this, if we play up to potential, none of these teams can touch us.
Also, I think A&M takes our second round bracket.

[Haptown]

I'm not worried about West Virginia. I am worried about Texas A&M.

Do you really think that aTm is capable of beating Vandy 4 times this year?

[DivergentDore]

I won $50 on a bet with an Aggie friend. I bet him that not only would Vandy be matched with Tx A&M for supers (two dominant lefty starters), we would get a 4 seed with a good lefty starter in our regional.

He's already paid.

[roanoke]

Haunted by the thought that we drew OSU as a 4 for ESPN to broadcast as a lead game Friday night -

while lower #1's drew Eastern Idaho to be relegated to ESPN3. (with #1 UCLA being on the west coast - for prime time purposes, we are #2 and Nashville-Columbus is a good tv ratings combo.) So Georgia Tech draws a team with a losing record as its 4?? But also lands Auburn and Coastal Carolina...

I do recognize that, for example, WVU drew very tough 2s and 3s (A&M and Duke) - and some 1's drew big name 2's (our 2 is plenty good - but not a national name), but the 4-pairing is very important to a 1-seed. And most 1's get a walk-through. I do not think we did. That affects what pitching is left in the next games.

As an aside, i have some family ties to McNeese State - and they have a very good baseball team this year. I am surprised they are not in Baton Rouge - but I am wondering if "the tv powers" thought sending Stony Brook back to a Baton Rouge regional made for a good story? By the same token, Oregon State got hot tourney champ Cincy as their 4.

For general comparison purposes - Arkansas' #4 is Central Connecticut - MSU's 4 is Southern. Ole Miss gets jax State. East Carolina got Quinnipiac. Anyway, such is life. We do get more prime time tv exposure - so i guess we just need to get it done.

[Commodoredave]

WVU is 15 - but paired with us as the 2. They have one major stud pitcher...

I'm not worried about West Virginia. I am worried about Texas A&M.

Agree. We lost two series all season and potentially get paired with them in the supers. Not a nice thing to do to the #2 overall.

[Good2BGold]

Haunted by the thought that we drew OSU as a 4 for ESPN to broadcast as a lead game Friday night -

while lower #1's drew Eastern Idaho to be relegated to ESPN3. (with #1 UCLA being on the west coast - for prime time purposes, we are #2 and Nashville-Columbus is a good tv ratings combo.) So Georgia Tech draws a team with a losing record as its 4?? But also lands Auburn and Coastal Carolina...

I do recognize that, for example, WVU drew very tough 2s and 3s (A&M and Duke) - and some 1's drew big name 2's (our 2 is plenty good - but not a national name), but the 4-pairing is very important to a 1-seed. And most 1's get a walk-through. I do not think we did. That affects what pitching is left in the next games.

As an aside, i have some family ties to McNeese State - and they have a very good baseball team this year. I am surprised they are not in Baton Rouge - but I am wondering if "the tv powers" thought sending Stony Brook back to a Baton Rouge regional made for a good story? By the same token, Oregon State got hot tourney champ Cincy as their 4.

For general comparison purposes - Arkansas' #4 is Central Connecticut - MSU's 4 is Southern. Ole Miss gets jax State. East Carolina got Quinnipiac. Anyway, such is life. We do get more prime time tv exposure - so i guess we just need to get it done.

I don't get all the angst about Ohio State. Their RPI is 126. They're not very good, and they play in the weakest by far of the Power 5 conferences in baseball. On the other hand, we're battle-tested. We play in the strongest of the Power 5 baseball conferences, and we won both the regular season and tournament titles, only seven losses in 34 games against SEC competition. Plus, we're playing on our field where we win 85 percent of the time. We're playing at night — we haven't lost a night game all season long. Also we're hot, having won 22 of our last 23 games. I think there is a better chance we run rule them than lose to them. I'm more worried about Indiana State, whose RPI is 24, and didn't use any of their weekend starters in their midweek loss to us during the regular season. There's one lefty in their weekend rotation and he normally pitches on Friday. It will be interesting to see if they hold him till Saturday in anticipation of playing us.