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A Serious Look at the Tournament

Publication Date: April 26, 2005

Winners Only

We've been here before; you know the format by now. First off, there are fifteen conferences where only the conference tournament winner will advance. Here they are, with my best wild guess at who will win:

Ladies and gentlemen, your #4 seeds.

One Possible At-Large Bid

There are five conferences with teams that will qualify for at-large bids if they need to, so bubble teams should hope for them to win their conference tournament:

Rice's taking over first in the WAC is probably bad news for the rest of the league, since the 2-4 teams have cannibalized each other to the point where it's likely none of them get in. Rice and Pepperdine will be #2 seeds, the rest will be #3s; Rice will host.

There are no independents who will qualify this year, so that leaves us with forty-four bids to play with.

Atlantic Coast

                            Conf    All    ISR  RPI  Status

North Carolina              14-4    35-8    25   11  I, #1
Georgia Tech                16-5    30-11   20    5  I, N#1
Miami, Florida              15-5    31-10   12    3  I, N#1
Clemson                     12-6    27-16   36   14  I, #1
Florida State               10-8    35-13   42   47  BI, #3(!)
North Carolina State        11-10   30-12   31   15  I, #2
Virginia                     9-10   30-13   62   40  BO

I would guess that the top three here get to host.

Big South

                            Conf    All    ISR  RPI  Status

Coastal Carolina            13-2    33-9    32   25  I, #2
Winthrop                    13-2    29-14   46   38  BI, #3
Birmingham-Southern         11-4    26-15   75   62  BO

Big Twelve

                            Conf    All    ISR  RPI  Status

Baylor                      13-5    28-16   11    6  I, N#1
Missouri                    10-5    30-11   43   56  BI, #3
Texas                       11-6    35-8     1    1  I, N#1
Nebraska                    10-6    35-9    19   44  I, #2
Oklahoma State               9-9    29-16   55   43  BI, #3
Texas Tech                   7-9    27-14   50   46  BI, #3
Oklahoma                     7-9    23-18   54   49  BO
Texas A&M                    6-12   26-19   39   45  BI, #4

There are all sorts of interesting things going on here, mostly because the conference has refused to play out to form this year. Texas is a pretty clear choice for best team in the country right now, but they're stuck in third here, which may cost them the national #1 seed. Missouri is holding on to second, but that's all that's keeping them in the field right now, and they could easily tumble all the way out. Nebraska is neither as good as their poll ranking nor as bad as their RPI, so who knows where they'll go. A&M is much better than they've played in conference; they've just plain been snakebit this year. This could end up anywhere between four and seven bids. Right now, I think Texas, Baylor, and Nebraska host.

Big West

                            Conf    All    ISR  RPI  Status

Cal State Fullerton          8-1    30-11    4   17  I, #1
Cal Poly                     8-1    27-14   23   72  I, #3
Long Beach State            10-2    29-14    6   22  I, #2
UC Irvine                    4-5    21-17   37   22  BI, #3

Kind of an off year for the league. Fullerton may get to host, especially if they can hike the RPI a bit, because of the Pac 10 situation. Irvine might be well served to get the conference record to .500; you never know.

Conference USA

                            Conf    All    ISR  RPI  Status

Tulane                      14-4    36-7     3    2  I, N#1
Texas Christian             13-5    29-13   38   42  I, #3
Southern Mississippi        11-7    29-12   33   30  I, #2
South Florida               10-7    25-21   89   69  BO
Alabama-Birmingham          10-8    26-15   72   75  BO
Louisville                   9-8    22-16   91  101  BO
Houston                      9-8    18-22   70   71  BO
East Carolina                9-9    24-16   56   31  BI, #3

This is a weird one, once you get past the top three. None of the 4-8 teams are currently at a point where they'd get in, but one of them almost has to in the long run. I'm going to pick ECU since they're probably the best of the batch and they're only 1.5 games out of fourth at the moment. Tulane will host.

Missouri Valley

                            Conf    All    ISR  RPI  Status

Creighton                   11-4    32-10   45   66  BI, #3
Wichita State                8-4    35-14   29   41  BI, #3

Pacific-10

                            Conf    All    ISR  RPI  Status

Arizona                     10-2    27-14   15   35  I, #2
Oregon State                 9-3    30-7     2    8  I, N#1
Arizona State                9-3    28-15    7   10  I, #1
Southern California          8-4    26-13    5   20  I, #2
Stanford                     7-5    24-15    8   21  I, #2
California                   7-8    27-18   27   63  BO
Washington                   4-8    24-17   28   61  BO

Cal and Washington are going to most likely be crying shames, although one of them could conceivably play their way in. USC West and Stanford are likely to be the scariest #2 seeds since, well, last year when they pulled the same crap, but you know what I mean.

There's an interesting phenomenon going on out West in regards to hosting this year. The two best candidates to host are Arizona State and Oregon State, assuming that Oregon State addresses their capacity problem with some temporary bleachers or something. That leaves Fullerton, USC West, and Stanford to scrap for a third site, with Fullerton having a slight edge at the moment. It's possible, if I'm being optimistic, that that might actually help some teams -- with only one California regional available, more teams are going to have to travel, and the logistics of getting somewhere back East aren't much different from getting to Tempe or Corvallis. We'll see, but there might be good things here.

Southeastern

                            Conf    All    ISR  RPI  Status

Florida                     13-5    30-10   10    4  I, N#1
Alabama                     11-7    30-13   34   27  I, #2
Tennessee                   10-7    30-13   40   32  I, #3
South Carolina              10-8    30-11   24   18  I, #2
Louisiana State             10-8    29-13   13    9  I, N#1
Mississippi State            9-8    28-12   30   26  I, #2
Vanderbilt                   9-9    28-12   26   12  I, #1
Mississippi                  9-9    29-13   17    7  I, #1
Arkansas                     8-10   32-11   14   19  I, #1
Auburn                       8-10   26-17   44   16  I, #2
Georgia                      6-11   22-18   53   29  BO

You want the really bad news? Kentucky is improving at the programatic and recruiting level.

Realistically, the only way the conference doesn't get ten bids at this point is if the committee decides that ten is too many. I can't predict that decision one way or the other. It's worth noting, though, that although the RPI does come in too high on most of them, the ISR's show the top ten here to be tournament-worthy. I'll guess that Florida, LSU, USC East, Arkansas, and Ole Miss get to host, but there's a lot of ball between now and that decision.

There's an oddity going on here and in the ACC in that several teams who would usually get a #1 based on RPI -- Clemson, NCSU, Vandy, Ole Miss, Arkansas, and Auburn -- are mired lower than expected in the standings. I'm assuming that situation will sort itself out, so any of that group could float between a #1 and a #2, and Southern California or Stanford could also slip in.

Southern

                            Conf    All    ISR  RPI  Status

College of Charleston       16-2    32-9    37   24  I, #2
Georgia Southern            13-4    28-12   47   23  I, #2
Elon                        15-9    26-18   81   57  BO

Sun Belt

                            Conf    All    ISR  RPI  Status

Louisiana-Lafayette          9-3    36-8    16   13  I, #1
South Alabama               10-5    26-18   60   39  BI, #3

Louisiana-Lafayette is the current sixteenth host team; they'll need to end well.

Pitch Count Watch

Rather than keep returning to the subject of pitch counts and pitcher usage in general too often for my main theme, I'm just going to run a standard feature down here where I point out potential problems; feel free to stop reading above this if the subject doesn't interest you. This will just be a quick listing of questionable starts that have caught my eye -- the general threshold for listing is 120 actual pitches or 130 estimated, although short rest will also get a pitcher listed if I catch it. Don't blame me; I'm just the messenger.

Date   Team   Pitcher   Opponent   IP   H   R   ER   BB   SO   AB   BF   Pitches
April 22 Cal State Fullerton Ricky Romero UC Davis 8.2 6 1 1 2 12 31 33 124
April 22 Hofstra David Huth William and Mary 7.0 9 4 2 5 4 28 35 121
April 22 Coastal Carolina Ricky Shefka Liberty 8.0 10 2 1 1 6 35 36 127
April 22 Virginia Tech Jake Chaney Marshall 8.0 8 4 2 3 9 29 34 125
April 22 McNeese State Jacob Marceaux Texas-Arlington 8.0 7 5 4 4 10 31 35 122
April 22 Fresno State Matt Garza Nevada 8.0 2 1 0 6 9 27 33 144(*)
April 22 Arkansas-Little Rock Bennett Cromer New Orleans 9.0 7 3 2 3 5 33 37 140(*)
April 22 South Alabama Jeramy Simmons Middle Tennessee State 8.1 7 5 5 6 7 30 37 142(*)
April 22 Utah Valley State Jed Jensen South Dakota State 7.2 9 5 2 4 6 32 37 143(*)
April 22 Oklahoma State Thomas Cowley Texas 9.0 6 4 2 3 6 31 36 123
April 22 Texas A&M-Corpus Christi Trey Hearne Northern Colorado 7.2 10 6 6 3 4 32 35 132
April 23 Alabama State Ricky Harris Mississippi Valley State 7.0 4 5 4 8 8 23 32 135(*)
April 23 Arkansas-Pine Bluff Kenyota Ento Texas Southern 6.0 14 10 10 5 4 30 38 146(*)
April 23 Baylor Mark McCormick Nebraska 6.2 4 1 1 2 9 24 26 125
April 23 Centenary J. C. Biagi Western Illinois 8.0 6 4 2 4 6 31 36 144(*)
April 23 Western Illinois Pat Kohorst Centenary 9.0 5 2 2 5 6 29 36 136(*)
April 23 Central Michigan Ty Dunham Northern Illinois 8.0 9 6 3 2 7 35 38 149(*)
April 23 The Citadel Justin Smith Charleston Southern 7.1 7 6 6 2 7 30 35 133
April 23 Clemson Robert Rohrbaugh North Carolina State 6.0 5 5 2 3 6 23 26 125
April 23 North Carolina A&T M Hauff Coppin State 9.0 7 0 0 2 14 34 36 152(*)
April 23 Appalachian State Scott Clark East Tennessee State 5.0 11 9 7 5 4 24 30 125
April 23 Southeast Missouri State Joey Evans Eastern Illinois 9.0 13 4 2 0 7 38 40 133
April 23 Florida Alan Horne Auburn 7.0 11 4 4 2 8 30 33 122
April 23 George Mason Gant Virginia Commonwealth 5.0 8 5 4 7 7 21 29 136
April 23 Western Carolina Brian Barnes Georgia Southern 7.2 10 6 5 2 5 34 38 121
April 23 Birmingham-Southern David Horne High Point 9.0 8 1 0 4 4 31 37 136
April 23 Kentucky Aaron Tennyson Mississippi State 9.0 15 5 3 3 3 40 45 141
April 23 Rice Eddie Degerman Louisiana Tech 7.2 5 1 0 2 10 26 28 122
April 23 Loyola Marymount S. Kahn San Francisco 9.0 1 0 0 7 6 26 35 137(*)
April 23 Norfolk State Williams Florida A&M 8.0 9 3 3 5 2 32 38 145(*)
April 23 Florida A&M Michael Tavernier Norfolk State 10.0 9 4 3 4 5 38 42 147(*)
April 23 Oakland Aaron Hines Chicago State 9.0 11 6 4 4 5 37 43 150(*)
April 23 Chicago State Chris Freshour Oakland 6.2 12 10 10 6 5 32 39 152(*)
April 23 North Carolina-Asheville Tim Johnson Radford 8.0 5 4 3 9 3 24 38 133(*)
April 23 Murray State Craig Kraus Tennessee Tech 7.0 13 6 4 1 4 34 35 122
April 23 Texas-Pan American Ricky Broyles Western Kentucky 9.0 12 1 1 2 5 37 39 146(*)
April 24 Boston College Joe Martinez Georgetown 9.0 9 4 4 2 11 36 38 151(*)
April 24 Georgia Will Startup Mississippi 9.0 6 3 3 5 3 29 38 134(*)
April 24 Georgia Southern Dustin Evans Western Carolina 9.0 5 1 1 3 6 31 35 121
April 24 Rice Joe Savery Louisiana Tech 9.0 5 2 0 0 8 31 32 121
April 24 North Carolina-Greensboro Chris Mason Elon 8.0 7 8 2 1 11 33 36 138
April 24 Northwestern State Dereck Cloeren Lamar 9.0 5 5 5 3 6 31 34 126
April 24 New York Tech Perez Quinnipiac 8.0 4 3 2 8 7 26 37 143(*)
April 24 Texas Adrian Alaniz Oklahoma State 7.0 9 3 3 0 8 27 33 126
April 24 Oklahoma State Rick Rivas Texas 8.0 6 2 2 5 6 29 36 133
April 24 Wagner Mike McTamney Sacred Heart 7.0 8 4 1 2 7 29 34 131
April 25 Yale Jon Hollis Dartmouth 9.0 8 3 3 2 6 31 37 134
April 25 Fairleigh Dickinson Stephen Eng Long Island 9.0 11 2 1 1 7 37 39 147(*)
April 26 Appalachian State Chad Antley Charlotte 7.0 7 2 2 3 5 26 30 123
April 26 Brown Dietz Harvard 9.0 10 8 1 4 8 40 46 159(*)
April 26 Louisiana Tech Mitch Tucker Louisiana-Monroe 7.0 8 3 3 2 8 29 32 124
April 26 Mississippi Anthony Cupps Memphis 6.0 4 3 3 3 12 23 27 122
April 26 Texas Southern Guillory Sam Houston State 9.0 12 12 8 7 10 38 47 157(*)
April 27 Brigham Young James Platt Northern Colorado 8.0 10 2 2 1 6 31 35 142
April 28 Nebraska Joba Chamberlain Oklahoma 6.2 6 5 2 4 6 23 29 125
April 28 Oklahoma Daniel McCutchen Nebraska 9.0 6 1 1 2 9 32 34 131

(*) Pitch count is estimated.

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