NCAA 2003 Division I College Baseball Brackets

Guys ....

Here are my predictions on who will make it to the Superregionals:

Virginia Commonwealth (NC State Regional)
Arizona State (ASU Regional)
Clemson (Auburn Regional)
Cal State Fullerton (CSF Regional)
FSU (FSU Regional)
Ga Tech (Ga Tech Regional)
Rice (Rice Regional)
Pepperdine (Long Beach State Regional)
LSU (LSU Regional)
Miami (Miami Regional)
Miss State (Miss State Regional)
Nebraska (Nebraska Regional)
Baylor (So Miss Regional)
Texas (Texas Regional)
Houston (Texas A&M Regional)
Stanford (Stanford Regional)

Only one regional, Nebraska, is being held north of the Mason Dixon Line. The other 15 regionals are being held in Sun Belt states. Three of major conferences, ACC, SEC, and Big 12, have three teams each holding regionals. This is another reason why Miami is switching to the ACC as the Big East does not have any power in the Olympic sports teams.

Tech's gone. Clemson is close.

GO COCKS

I am still in contention with my regionals picks as I am tracking a 12-4 record. The big upsets are Georgia Tech and Climpson losing and going home to eat bar-b-que (i.e. get 2 losses and you eat bar-b-que because you are done). My alma mater, FSU, is hanging on the skins of their teeth. The Noles must beat South Alabama (USA) twice to get to the Superregional.

The Miami Regional had a football game broke out in it as uf beat FAU 22-14. The balls must have been flying out of the Light. I know that the Canes contingent was rooting for FAU.

Some surprises today in the elimination round.

GaTech never even made it to today. They got booted in their first two games, and were left to watch the rest of the weekend. Ouch! South Carolina benefited and advanced out of the regional.

UNC went to Starksville and took the regional away from favored host Mississippi State. UNC is one of three ACC schools left in the super-regional round. (NCSU won on their home field and FSU is in the process of beating South Alabama twice today to advance.)

SW Mo State pulled off the shocker today beating Nebraska for the second time in two days and knocking them out of the tournament. The CWS is played 30 minutes down the highway in Omaha (nice stadium there), so this hurts for the Huskers.

Ohio State went to Auburn and pulled out the big upset to advance for the Big Ten. The only Big Ten school to make it to the final 16.

And, of course, the near shock of all shocks -- little Lamar University almost upended the Longhorns in Austin and sent the highly rated UT team home for the season. That would have been the huge upset on the weekend. Texas won the second game today 6-2 to advance to next weekends super-regionals.

Most of the top seeds have upheld (or appear to be on their way to upholding) their seeding. Miami is ahead of Florida in the 7th. Texas A&M needs to beat Houston to survive and they are early in their second game of the day. FSU is ahead comfortably, or so it would appear in their second game of the day.

Was glad to see Tech go, but I wish they had stuck around for at least one game against the Cocks. My Gamecocks now will host North Carolina
instead of having to travel in the super-regional round of the tourney. Who knew it would be two second seeds facing each other? This should still be a good series as the two teams have good baseball histories. Speaking of history, the Gamecoks beat the Tarheels last year in the Super-regionals, to advance to the College World Series, where they fought their way back through the losers bracket to make it to the championship game where they lost to a powerful Texas team.

Any other info on teams still in the tourney?

One of the more interesting matchups is SW Mo St versus Ohio State. Two teams seeded third who pulled off upsets on the road. Now one of them will get to advance to the CWS and represent their conference in the tourney. Pretty cool overall.

Columbus hosts the Ohio State-Southwest Missouri State superregional; Columbia hosts the SC-NC superregional. At least one more host seed will lose; I'm hoping it is LSU (their fans are the most obnoxious to attend the CWS). The two west coast hosts, Stanford and Cal State Fullerton, host two tough teams in Long Beach State and Arizona State, respectively. SMS is the only one of the regional winners never to have played in Omaha, though NC and Ohio State have not been for a long while.

Grand Junction hosts the Junior College World Series every year; this year the Community College of Southern Nevada won the tournament. Central Missouri State won Division II, in Montgomery; and Chapman won Division III.

Omaha is a fun place to be in mid-June; will anyone out there actually be attending? We went in 1995, 1997 and 1999, when we lived on the other side of the Rocky Mountains. We may go next year (or we may go--gasp!--to the women's softball championships in OK City). My sister-in-law wonders what two gay guys see in women's softball, but we watched almost every televised game this past year. My better half loves the Bruins, what I can I say!

How bout my NOLES! They beat USA twice yesterday. Thank God that UM pulled it out against the gators ..... at least it was an interesting Sunday at Mark Light. However, as in history past, the gators choke again! Where is Rodney Brewer!!

I would much rather venture to OK City to see the women play than Omaha to see the men. I was actually consulting in Omaha 3 years ago during the CWS. It is a rabid kind of time in town. Omaha is not all that big overall, but during CWS time it is out of control.

I have wanted to attend the WCWS tournament for a while now. Perhaps next year.

Some of the games this weekend will be televised on ESPN and ESPN2.

Link to schedule

Cool. I finally found a thread about NCAA baseball. Texas fan here, hoping we pull the upset and knock Florida State out this weekend. It sucks that two of the best teams in the country have to meet before the CWS, but when you have a committee chair that stacks the brackets for the SEC and denies the Big 12 any national seeds, you end up with a screwed up bracket.

Good call JT on Houston knocking off the ever choking Aggies on their home field.

Hook 'em

As the only North team representin, go Ohio State ! So is SW Missouri State any good ?

The Field of 8 teams are set for the CWS:

College World Series
June 13-22/23
Rosenblatt Stadium
Omaha, Nebraska
Double elimination brackets

Friday, June 13
Game 1 -- South Carolina (44-20) vs. Stanford (46-15), 2 p.m.
Game 2 -- Cal State Fullerton (48-14) vs. LSU (45-20-1), 7 p.m.
Saturday, June 14
Game 3 -- SW Missouri State (40-24) vs. Rice (53-11), 1:30 p.m.
Game 4 -- Texas (48-18) vs. Miami (Fla.) (44-15-1), 7 p.m.

Too bad about my NOLES! They will not be going to Omaha this year. Now, I must root for the Canes and hope they can knock off Texas.

This afternoon, I turned on ESPN and ran into A&F commercial with the Rice v. Houston game. I have never seen so many hotties on one field. Woof! Woof! Especially # 7 from Rice. Besides rooting for the Canes, I will be adopting Rice as my other favorite CWS team.

Yawn...(checking watch, flipping thru calendar) Two months until football.

JT - from all the accounts the Seminole fans were awesome at the games, the Animals in particular. In fact, the Animals web page has a nice tribute to the Horns on it right now; they want us to beat Miami! here's hoping.....

Texas: Back home in Omaha

Hook 'em

I am rooting for my alma mater, the Texas Longhorns, all of the way!! This will be one of the toughest, yet intriguing, College World Series, in quite awhile!! Of the 8 teams, 5 are previous champions, 7 are multi-participants, and then you have the Cinderella first-time participant, in Southwest Missouri State, who should not be taken for granted BTW!! They are loaded with power hitters, a decent defense, and an above-average, but not deep, pitching staff. Talk about intrigue!! I am looking forward to it!! Go Horns!!

The next two weeks are definitely going to be fun. Hope USC and LSU manage to win and play each other for the right to play in the championship series with USC coming out on top. I know it's going to be tough to be the Cal schools but definitely possible.

GO SEC

BTW I agree on the Rice vs. Houston series. Was definitely happy to see that one go to three. Might relocate to Houston, seems like they have an overflow of cute guys there.

The Longhorn's rule! Texas is again going all the way to capture the the CWS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

To all of the CUTE Texas boys on this webpage ... I am sorry that I have to root for the Canes but my dad and uncle graduated from the University. In addition, I had many wonderful childhood memories going to UM baseball games at the Light when Ron Fraser was head coach and Skip Bertram was the associate head coach.

Yes, I was a former ANIMAL during my days in Tally Ho. FSU baseball fans are similiar to Dukie basketball fans as being totally into the game and knowing everything about their opponents.

BTW, I might relocated to Houston too!

The Longhorn's Huston Street is f**king amazing! I've never seen a college closing pitcher of that caliber.

I totally agreee!! He is widely considered one of the best closers in all of college baseball and he is only a sophomore. When he enters a game, he is lights out with a 97mph fastball!! He has 28 career saves(already a Longhorn record), with just one blown save, and he is a cutie as well!!

I love college baseball, especially the CWS. It's the only division one event I get into. I think it's way better than MLB. For instance, These guys hustle more, get hit by pitches and don't rush the mound, all without a million dollar pay day. You say pitching is lacking, I say nay to thee. While the pitching is not as fine tuned as the pros, these boys still make it dance around with a little pepper, even with the cursed aluminum bat. The best thing is the game moves faster. Oh and the season is just right. MLB with 162 games and a drawn out playoff, horsecrap! Although, I will watch the World Series.

When the CWS starts, I really don't pull for anyone team but I've watched Rice play all there games and they have been winning with pitching and defense. I love the basics. So I'm with Rice all the way. However, they don't have much offense that might kill em'. I hope college baseball and the CWS never go the way of division one basketball and football

[ June 18, 2003, 01:56 PM: Message edited by: budge ]

Well, I learned today that there no longer is a winner-take-all championship game on Saturday. It's now a best-of-three series with games Saturday, Sunday and (if needed) Monday. Whether you think that's "going the way of Division I basketball and football" is up for debate. But I'm sort of disappointed that it's not one game anymore.

I think that the one game format failed to reward teams for deep pitching staffs. All you needed was one ace at the end. The whole CWS used to be double elimination and I thought that was fair. I am not sure why they ended up with this hybrid, double elimination bracket, plus double elimination championship series except to emphasis the value of deep staffs.

The final four everyone predicted has come true and we will likely see the expected final series between Rice and Fullerton. As much as I love Texas, I am not sure they can get two from Rice's pitching staff. And Stanford has now lost five in a row to Fullerton. Not sure they can pull off two in a row now.

And, by the way, since this is OutSports I feel comfortable in syaing that the number of hot guys out there is astounding. I mean: wow. It's semi-porn, if you ask me, especially Miami's ultra tight white pants. These guys are masculine and hot. Ok, enough.

Hook 'em Horns.

Yeah it should illegal to have that much man candy out there. I was hoping they would keep the winner take all final too, but, I don't see them changing it to the FedEx CWS or some other corporate whoring, yet.

[ June 18, 2003, 03:05 PM: Message edited by: budge ]

The rule change at CWS was done back in the mid 90's to accomodate network TV and generate fan interest. It went from the old double elimination tourney bracket to two divisions of double elimination tourney games with the winner of each division playing Saturday on CBS.

However, in past CWS national championship games, you will have a team that unbeaten playing another team that must played on Thursday with one loss in Saturday's national championship game. Whereas, the team with the one loss will win the Saturday's national championship game and the loser have the same record as the national champions team.

Now, the NCAA has moved toward a best of three series for the national championship just like the super regionals.

In the future, I am predicting the NCAA recommending the start of college baseball season to mid March with the regionals, superregionals, and the CWS taking place in July.

BTW, Rice has the most hottest guys on any team in the CWS especially # 7. All of the Owls are smart f--kers because Rice has tough academic standards like Stanford, William & Mary, and Dukie. Regarding U of Miami's uniforms, I got wet in my A&F shorts watching the Canes played my Noles back on Easter Weekend at Mark Light. You can see the color of the players' underwears or no underwear.

Loved the game last night. Especially, that gnarly injury. When dude came back, I thought he had some chaw in his mouth but the corner of his mouth was split like a couple of inches. Stanfords pretty scrappy and with Rice's pitching, It'll be a good series.

Uh! How could the operators of this site not put Stanford's rousing victory in their daily Jock Talk? Oh, wait a second . . . wink

Go CARDINAL (though, I'm not expecting much).

I am sorry to not see my Longhorns in the Finals, even though they overachieved by getting to the CWS, and then to the Final Four. It should be a good Finals, between Rice and Stanford though. Stanford has the power hitting and Rice with the superb pitching staff and defense!! There are alot of intelluctual hotties in this CWS Finals!!

I caught the Fullerton-Stanford game last night as well, budge, and that was one helluva entertaining game....after the CSF infielder returned to the dugout from the hospital late in the game (with the corner of his mouth split open and swollen to about four times its normal size) and the reaction and emotion displayed by his teammates I thought for sure the Titans were going to pull it out....gotta give credit to the Cardinal, though, for their late inning play -- they are always one of the more fundamentally sound teams in the country.

With Stanford and Rice meeting for the title not only will that series show some of the smartest kids in the country but the eye candy (especially from all those cute Rice Owls) will be something to behold....I actually think this new best of three championship series is a better indicator of the true national champion (too bad it wasn't in effect last year when my Gamecocks lost in the one game finale to Texas ) as the coaches will have to use their pitching staff wisely and it should provide for some entertaining, hard fought action.

[ June 20, 2003, 10:35 AM: Message edited by: gamecock ]

Okay JT. Is it just me or is Rice awfully white? I know about the academic standards, the high scores and campus BMW atmosphere-but aren't there any Latino's or Black that could play for them? They have one Latino- But here's my review #10 and #11 are the hottest..
Lance Pendleton

and Paul Janish

OK guys,I know those Owls are hot,but I need some good karma from people pulling for the Cardinal. Baby needs Boots!!! wink I'm in a winner take all pool for the CWS,and in a blind draw I lucked out and got the Cardinal.I'm only 2 wins away from paydirt,and after cussing out my tv last night enroute to a miraculous comeback,I can practically taste the sweetness of victory.
GO BIG RED!!! er... Cardinal!!

Well Stanford isn't exactly a poster for the Rainbow Coalition either! wink

Seriously though, academic standards are a factor to be sure. But also, I would think there are just alot more white kids playing baseball in the US. Black kids are playing more basketball and football. I hope that doesn't sound too stereotypical as I don't want to insult anyone. But it seems pretty accurate due to the shortage of playing fields for baseball in urban areas. The explosion of Latino players in MLB has come mostly from foreign-born players from Latin America.

Actually, from what I've read, the number of black baseball players in the majors is in decline, perhaps because of the reasons you cite. It's also possible (but I can't say without stats) that black baseball players might be more inclined to turn pro out of high school for economic reasons.

I'll answer your question with a question: why does it matter?

That might be true, but the African-American percentages on a typical major league team (excluding Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Latino players) are still a higher percentage than the general population. So I repeat: why does this matter?

Correction to g_vf: a lot of Latinos in the Big Leagues are now coming out of South Florida and not just Puerto Rico, the Dominican and Venezuela. This is not a pool from which a school like Rice draws ... although it is yet another reason why the big Florida programs tend to dominate college baseball just like they do football.

[ June 20, 2003, 12:02 PM: Message edited by: Charlie in the Trees ]

CITT: To answer the question- it matters because a fine school like Rice could include in its alumini a little more diversity by selecting athletes of color and/or minority community to be on their team. Athletes by and large are an exception to College Level Entry standards. The Software company that I work for routinely recruits computer science grads from Rice- we would jump on the opportunity to meet a Black or Latino Computer Science Grad or student from Rice. Rice's undergrad is 65%+ White.

Rice Student Facts

I just noticed the lack of diversity on Rice. Stanford is not much better but it tries. It covers lots of it's diversity with the help of Asian Students that are drawn by geographics (its only 40% White)and also have super academics.
Stanford Student Facts

But back to Sports- I'll be rooting for Rice.

[ June 23, 2003, 07:53 AM: Message edited by: Eastsidewa ]

Ya know what the NBA is pretty black but I'm not complaining. Is it possible for anyone to talk about something without bitching about race? Yes, college baseball is very white, like CITT says who cares? Auburns entire starting defense was black last year, I sure didn't care. They were great. How about more people prefer white bread over pumpernickle? Sounds like a race problem in there somewhere. Geez, this series is going to be a lot of fun, the last thing I'm going to think about is racial inequity. Sorry if I sound like a bitch or unsympathetic, but sometimes there isn't always a plot to keep minorities down. I'll be looking for a good game. Rice wins series 2-1

[ June 20, 2003, 04:49 PM: Message edited by: budge ]

Not to prolong this race card issue, but statistics show that most of the heralded minority high schoolers are high MLB draft picks and never step foot on college campuses. This past draft had an African American as the top overall pick(not the first time BTW) and Alex Rodriguez(another minority) was the number one overall pick about ten years ago, and never played college baseball. In closing on this point, most of the really good highschoolers(which a high percentage are minorities BTW) never enter college, whether it be for economic reasons or other reasons, etc. While on this subject, the go-ahead homerun for Stanford was hit by an African American last night BTW!!

[ June 20, 2003, 09:27 PM: Message edited by: SmoothRon ]

For more Stanford baseball photos:
http://www.thediamondangle.com/college.html