{"id":9099,"date":"2014-05-28T08:02:48","date_gmt":"2014-05-28T12:02:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=9099"},"modified":"2014-05-30T12:25:32","modified_gmt":"2014-05-30T16:25:32","slug":"cws-field-of-64-announced-teams-and-analysis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=9099","title":{"rendered":"CWS Field of 64 announced; teams and analysis"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"CWS<\/a><\/p>\n

Hot on the heels of our “local college team<\/a>” post earlier this week, the full 64-team field has been announced. \u00a0(here’s a cool picture of all 64 uniforms<\/a> in the tourney)<\/p>\n

A preliminary announcement earlier on 5\/26\/14 stated the 16 regional hosts<\/a>, each of whom is also automatically in the field.\u00a0 The full field announcement<\/a> came later in the day (link from College Baseball Blog<\/a>\u00a0and nicely formatted regional pairings<\/a> from BaseballAmerica). \u00a0Oregon State got the #1 overall seed in the field of 64 and the Top 16 National seeds<\/span><\/strong> are:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Oregon State: Pac-12 regular season champ (no tourney)<\/li>\n
  2. Florida: SEC Eastern Division and overall regular season champion, Conference tourney runner-up<\/li>\n
  3. Virginia: 2nd ACC coastal division<\/li>\n
  4. Indiana: Big-10 regular season and conference tourney champion.<\/li>\n
  5. Florida State: ACC Atlantic division champion.<\/li>\n
  6. Louisiana-Lafayette: Sun Belt regular season and conference tourney champion.<\/li>\n
  7. TCU: Big-12 2nd place regular season, conference tournament Champion<\/li>\n
  8. LSU: 2nd SEC Western division, conference tourney champion.<\/li>\n
  9. Rice: Conference USA regular season and conference tourney champion.<\/li>\n
  10. Cal Poly: Big West regular season champ (no tourney)<\/li>\n
  11. Ole Miss: SEC Western Division champion<\/li>\n
  12. Louisville: American Athletic Conference regular season champion, Conference tourney runner-up<\/li>\n
  13. Vanderbilt: 3rd SEC Western division<\/li>\n
  14. South Carolina: 2nd SEC Eastern division,<\/li>\n
  15. Miami: ACC Coastal Division and overall regular season champion,<\/li>\n
  16. Oklahoma State: Big-12 regular season champion, Conference tourney runner-up<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    By inferring the stated match-ups of regional hosts, we infer the 9th-16 national seeds from the regional hosts:\u00a0The 16 regional hosts *usually* are also the top 16 seeds of the tournament, though there have been some deviations from this in the past. \u00a0However these seem accurate based on RPI rankings and typical top-25 votes.<\/p>\n

    Seeding Analysis<\/strong><\/span>: I thought Oregon State was slightly over-seeded at #1; I think you have to put Florida or Florida State there based on their record, Strength of Schedule (SoS) and the conferences they play in. \u00a0 Otherwise in some form or fashion I think your top 8 seeds are correct. \u00a0 Some are complaining about Indiana but their RPI and BA ranks are top 8 material and there’s no team seeded 9-12 that can make a real strong case to rise. \u00a0 I think teams like Houston, Washington and Texas were pretty hard done by not getting at least a regional host\/9-16 seed. \u00a0How does the Pac-12 get the #1 overall seed but its 2nd best team doesn’t even rate a top 16 seed? \u00a0Meanwhile Houston is 10th in RPI and #15 in the latest BA poll, and they have to go to LSU to compete against a championship-calibre team.<\/p>\n

    (Note: CollegeBaseballBlog is reviewing every regional this week ahead of the weekend games. \u00a0Click here for an example<\/a>).<\/p>\n

    Easiest Regionals<\/strong>:\u00a0<\/span>Miami, who in their 42nd consecutive CWS appearance gets Ivy league champ Columbia as its regional THREE seed and a team with a losing record as its 4th seed. \u00a0Of course, Miami’s prize will be a super-regional matchup with my tournament favorite Florida and a likely trip home. \u00a0 Oregon State’s regional looks incredibly straight forward; its #2 and #3 seeds are from smaller baseball conferences and its #2 seed (UNLV) just lost their friday starter (Erick Fedde<\/strong>) to Tommy John. \u00a0\u00a0Indiana’s regional looks pretty easy all things considered, and\u00a0Florida State’s regional isn’t difficult, with middling SEC team Alabama and small conference schools to contend with.<\/span><\/p>\n

    Hardest Regionals<\/strong><\/span>: LSU; they get Houston, a team that should have been seeded as well as conference champ Bryant. \u00a0Oklahoma State got no favors with Nebraska and traditional power Cal-State Fullerton. \u00a0Rice gets #12 RPI ranked Texas to go with Texas A&M. \u00a0Ole Miss gets 14th ranked and under-seeded Washington to go with 25th ranked Georgia Tech and a pesky 4th seed in Jacksonville State. \u00a0\u00a0Florida\u00a0has three teams ranked inside of the RPI #50 in its regional; no cupcakes here and it includes the best #4 seed in the tourney (College of Charleston with local favorite Taylor Clarke<\/strong>). \u00a0TCU gets baseball powerhouse Dallas Baptist to go along with Sam Houston State, a team ranked in and out of the top 25 all year. \u00a0Lastly Louisville has a regional that looks like a fantastic basketball tournament; they have Kentucky, Kansas and Kent State. \u00a0Kentucky and Kansas were in the top 25 as recently as earlier this month and this could be a very competitive regional.<\/p>\n

    Snubs<\/strong><\/span>: West Virginia was the highest RPI ranked team left out (#38) but that was mostly on their SoS; they were barely a .500 team overall and were just 9-14 in divisional play. \u00a0Next in RPI rankings missing out were Mercer (#46), UCF (#48), and UC Santa Barbara (#50). \u00a0Central Florida likely was the “last team out” and Clemson\/UC Irvine were the “last teams in.” \u00a0Duke may feel a bit unfairly done by; they finished ahead of two other NCAA teams in the conference standings. \u00a0CAA champ William & Mary just didn’t have the SOS to get in after losing the conference tournament. \u00a0 Wright State won its conference going 25-4 in division only to lose the tournamnet to the team that finished dead last in conference play (Youngstown State).<\/p>\n

    (Links to other analysis from CollegeBaseballDaily blog<\/a>, BaseballAmerica cool facts and tidbits<\/a>, and BaseballAmerica field of 64 analysis<\/a> by Aaron Fitt<\/strong>).<\/p>\n

    Local Rooting Interests<\/strong><\/span>: #3 overall seed and regional host\u00a0UVA.\u00a0 Liberty (#3 seed in Charlottesville region), Old Dominion (#3 seed in South Carolina’s region), George Mason (#4 seed in Rice’s regional), and U of Maryland (#2 seed in South Carolina region).\u00a0 Tough matchup for Liberty. \u00a0Maryland returns to the tournament for the first time in 43 years<\/a>, an amazing fact. \u00a0George Mason not only has to travel to Dallas, but they get two top 12 ranked teams in Rice and Texas. \u00a0Its hard to envision any of these teams besides host UVA advancing.<\/p>\n

    Big-time draft prospects to watch<\/strong><\/span>: Many of the biggest names in the upcoming draft failed to make the tourney (Carlos Rodon<\/strong>,\u00a0Bradley Zimmer<\/strong>,\u00a0Sean Newcomb<\/strong> and Jeff Hoffman<\/b>). \u00a0But you will have:<\/p>\n