Eight Super-Regionals will fill the weekend as the Regional survivors fight for a trip to Omaha and the College World Series. Just about all of the favorites made it through to the 2nd weekend of the tournament, so we should be treated to some high quality baseball. Say what you want about Cinderellas—but I like when really good teams play each other in the playoffs. Yeah, I’m the anti-Christ.
Since there are eight separate series, we’ll give you a quick take on each series. If I wrote everything I thought about every single series, this “preview” wouldn’t be published until after the series are over.
NCAA Super-Regional Previews
June 5th – June 7th
Louisville Cardinals at Cal State Fullerton Titans: The Louisville Cardinals got to host their 1st Regional ever last weekend and parlayed it into a trip to the Super-Regionals. On the other side of the diamond awaits CSUF—who seemingly hosts Regionals and Super-Regionals every year. The Big West took some serious hits last weekend, but the #2 seeded Titans bombed through their Regional. Something that helped was they were the only team in their Regional that has pitchers on scholarship. They’ll need the pitching to come through against the power-hitting line-up of Louisville.
Arkansas Razorbacks at Florida State Seminoles: Alright, so if you want to see runs, this is probably the series for you. Take two teams that have been scoring in double digits all season, add the fact that the Seminoles have been scoring runs like their football team, and then mix in some aluminum bats and tell me what YOU think will happen? With all of the runs that everyone expects—I want to see which team has a little pitching. If either pitching staff can slow the opposition down, they’ll be in Nebraska next weekend. I know that everyone is impressed with Florida State and their SportsCenter worthy 37 runs against Ohio State. But more impressive to me was the way Arkansas completely dominated #8 national seed Oklahoma in Norman. By the end of the Regional, I was wondering if Arkansas was that good or the Sooners were that bad. We’ll probably find out this weekend.
That smile probably comes from his pitching staff...
Virginia Cavaliers at Ole Miss Rebels: Both teams can hit—and I mean really hit. We’re talking about 2 teams that won over 40 games and hit over .315 over the course of the season. Here’s what it boils down to though: both teams can hit, Virginia has a better #1 pitcher and overall pitching staff and they’re probably the hottest team in the nation. They won the nightmare-ish ACC tournament, and then traveled 3000 miles to destroy the #1 UC Irvine Anteaters in the Regional. No disrespect to Ole Miss, but they better hope that the home field advantage in Oxford pays off!
Rice Owls at LSU Tigers: This might be the most evenly matched series of the weekend. When you look at their overall stats from the regular season, both their batting average and their opponents’ batting average are very similar. The two things that LSU has going for them are that they have a little more power than Rice and that they’re playing at home. We’ll see if the NEW Alex Box Stadium has the same ghosts that helped the Tigers to LAST year’s College World Series.
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June 6th – June 8th
TCU Horned Frogs at Texas Longhorns: Two of the three Texas teams will match-up in Austin with all kinds of bragging rights on the line. Just like the ECU vs. UNC Super-Regional, we’re going to see a contrast of styles. If we see high-scoring games, we’ll probably see a couple of TCU victories. If we see low-scoring games, Texas coach Augie Garrido will be smiling once again. Texas doesn’t have the pop in their line-up that you’d expect from a #1 overall seed—but they have the pitching that more than makes up for it. A couple of dominant pitchers with ERAs that hover around 2.00 are always a good way to find success. It’s going to be tough for TCU to put up the same kind of numbers against the Longhorns that they’ve grown accustomed to all season.
Southern Miss Golden Eagles at Florida Gators: Yes, Florida is a good team. They played well in the SEC all season and earned their #8 national seeding. But this series may very well hinge on which Southern Miss team shows up. In the Regionals, Southern Miss looked like a different team against Georgia Tech en route to pulling off the biggest upset of the first weekend. I’m not smart enough to know if they’ll be able to pull off another upset, but they’re going to have to score some runs if they want to win. Somehow, I don’t think a squad that has an overall team ERA of over 5.00 is going to be able to win any 2-1 games against a team that can hit. The Golden Eagles were able to put runs on the board in every game they won in Atlanta—there’s the recipe for success.
Arizona State is a team that's been here before...
Clemson Tigers at Arizona State Sun Devils: Anything can happen in a Super Regional series—after all, that’s why the play the games. But if I were a betting man (no comment), this is the series that I’d have a field day with. Arizona State looks like they’re better in just about every facet of the game. ASU ace Mike Leake is 15-1 this season with a 1.23 ERA and 7 complete games—AND he has experience in the World Series. Oh, and if that’s not enough, the Clemson Tigers have to travel 3 time zones just to get to Tempe. Waiter, check please.
East Carolina Pirates at North Carolina Tar Heels: If you want to see a contrast of styles class on a baseball field, you might want to direct your attention to Chapel Hill over the weekend. If you like pitching, you’ll like the Tar Heels. If you like hitting, you’ll like the Pirates. The Tar Heels have one of the best pitching staffs in the entire nation with a few guys that can put people down in a hurry. Combined with the strong pitching staff is Dustin Ackley. On a team that can pitch, Ackley provides the pop with a .417 batting average, 21 home runs and 66 RBIs. East Carolina has an entire line-up filled with pop—but they did it against a Conference USA schedule. I’m curious to see if their big bats will be able to continue their hot hitting against a team like North Carolina. I doubt it, but we’ll see.
If you want interactive brackets and updates of all the Super-Regionals, here’s the spot for you.
