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Automatic
Bids
Seventeen
automatic bids have now been determined. Here are the conference
champions that are heading to play in Regional action beginning on
Friday:
| Conference |
Team |
|
Conference |
Team |
| America East |
Stony Brook |
|
MEAC |
Florida A&M |
| Atlantic 10 |
Virginia Commonwealth |
|
Ohio Valley |
Morehead State |
| Atlantic Sun |
Lipscomb |
|
Pac-12 |
UCLA |
| Big South |
Radford |
|
Patriot League |
Lehigh |
| Big West |
Cal State Fullerton |
|
Southland |
Houston Baptist |
| Colonial |
UNC Wilmington |
|
Summit League |
Oral Roberts |
| Horizon |
Wright State |
|
SWAC |
Texas Southern |
| Ivy League |
Columbia |
|
West Coast |
Pepperdine |
| Metro Atlantic |
Canisius |
|
|
|
ACC
Florida
State secured a spot in the ACC Tournament Championship Game with a
decisive 6-0 win over Louisville
on Saturday afternoon. The Seminoles received a huge lift from
starting pitcher Drew Carlton, who threw seven scoreless innings and
allowed five hits. Florida State only managed seven hits of their own
and benefitted from an uncharacteristically poor performance from the
Louisville bullpen, but Seminoles center fielder Ben DeLuzio
(3-for-4, home run, 2 RBI) had another nice day at the plate.
Although
both teams were already eliminated, Miami and Notre Dame played an
entertaining and
hard-fought game. Notre Dame scored two runs in the top of the ninth
off of Miami closer Bryan Garcia to take a 5-4 lead, but they couldn’t
hold it as Chris Barr led off the bottom half with a solo homer and
Brian Lopez won it a few batters later with an RBI single
right-center field.
American
Athletic
The
top two seeded teams, Houston and East Carolina, will face each other
in the championship game after knocking off Memphis and UConn
respectively.
The
Cougars clobbered the Tigers 17-3, scoring four runs in the third and
five in both the fourth and eighth innings. That was more than enough
for starter Kyle Dowdy who tossed a complete game (eight innings)
scattering three hits and three walks.
East
Carolina's win over UConn was a much more tightly contested affair,
with the Pirates winning 4-2. Starter Jacob Wolfe allowed just one
earned run on seven hits in seven innings while striking out six to
earn the win (5-2).
Big
12
Texas
advances to the Big 12 championship game to face No. 2-seed Oklahoma
State on the strength of Connor Mayes complete game shutout over
Baylor. Texas' pitching staff is in great shape as Mayes' complete
game was the Longhorns' third in the row. Tres Barrera hit a two-run
bomb in the first which proved to be all the runs Texas would need in
a 4-0 win.
Oklahoma
State first baseman Dustin Williams had of his team's six hits in a
3-for-4 effort that includes two doubles, a triple, two runs scored
and two RBI in the Cowboys' 5-1 over Oklahoma.
Big
Ten
Mighty
Illinois, whose 27-game win streak was snapped two days ago at the
hands of Maryland, fell again on Saturday to get knocked out of the
Big Ten tournament. No. 3-seeded Michigan emerged as the 5-3 winners
in this game, as Jacob Cronenworth went 3-for-3 in the game with
three RBI and also tossed 1 2/3 innings to close out the game and
record his seventh save of the year.
The
Wolverines will face the Terrapins, as Maryland knocked out the pesky
Indiana Hoosiers with a 4-2 win. The game was scoreless through six
innings until Maryland hung a four-spot in the bottom of the seventh,
as starters Caleb Baragar and Ryan Selmer exchanged zeroes through
the first five and 5 2/3 innings respectively.
SEC
Dansby
Swanson homered for the fourth time in the SEC Tournament as
Vanderbilt cruised to
a 12-3 win over Texas A&M and advanced to the SEC Championship
Game. Will Toffey also went 2-for-4 and had a home run of his own.
John Kilichowski came on in relief of Commodore starter Walker
Buehler and threw five hitless innings to pick up his third win of
the season. The Aggies had three errors in the field and now have 70,
the most in the conference, on the season.
Florida
also advanced to the SEC Championship Game as they beat top-seeded
LSU 2-1 in dramatic
fashion. Freshman catcher Mike Rivera hit a solo home run to break a
1-1 tie in the top of the ninth and that proved to be the difference.
The Gators had wasted a number of good scoring chances in the first
eight innings as LSU starting pitcher Alex Lange wasn’t at his
sharpest, but battled very well to limit any damage. Reliever Taylor
Lewis was lights out for the Gators, allowing just one hit in 4 1/3
innings and picking up the victory.
Sun
Belt
The
top-seeded South Alabama Jaguars and third-seeded Louisiana-Lafayette
Ragin Cajuns will play on Sunday to
determine who wins the Sun Belt Conference Championship.
South
Alabama, having not dropped a game all tournament, dispatched of
Arkansas State in Saturday’s first
game. The Jaguars got a strong start from Austin Bembnowski (8.1
innings, 6 hits, 3 earned runs, 6 walks, 7 strikeouts) and Adam
Ballew had three hits to pace the offense in a 7-3 game.
Louisiana-Lafayette
had their backs against the wall, but they prevailed after beating Texas
State two times on Saturday to advance to the final. The Ragin’
Cajuns won the first game 3-0 thanks to a great pitching performance
by Wyatt Marks (7 innings, 4 hits, 0 runs, 3 walks, 8 strikeouts) who
had struggled on Thursday night and was removed after just one third
of an inning in that game. In the decisive second game, Steven
Trosclair (3-for-5, RBI, 2 R) and Nick Thurman (1-for-4, 2B, 2 RBI)
helped Louisiana-Lafayette jump out to an early lead and hold on for
a 6-2 win.
National
Notes
• UNC-Wilmington
prevailed in a back-and-forth affair with the College of Charleston
to win
the CAA Tournament by a final score of 7-6. UNC Wilmington’s Corey
Dick was named tournament MVP and he was 3-for-5 with two RBI on the
day. His crucial RBI double in seventh inning made it 7-5 and gave
the Seahawks a much-needed insurance run.
•
Virginia Commonwealth
captured the Atlantic 10 Championship with a 5-3 victory over Rhode Island. VCU left
fielder James Bunn went 2-for-3 and delivered the game-winning RBI
with a single in the bottom of the eighth inning.
•
Stony Brook beat UMBC
in a 16-11 slugfest to win the America East Tournament, their second title in as many years.
The Seawolves erased an early seven run deficit with by scoring 11
runs in the second inning. Cole Peragine (3-for-5, 3 RBI) and Toby
Handley (4-for-7, 3 RBI) led the way for the Stony Brook lineup.
•
Wright State won
convincingly to capture the Horizon League Tournament title. After they dropped the first
game of the championship series 5-4, Wright State left no doubt in
the decisive second game and cruised to a 17-4 victory over
Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
• Oral
Roberts shut out IUPUI-Fort Wayne and won its 16th Summit League
Tournament Title with a 6-0 win on Saturday. Oral Roberts improved to
41-14 overall and 25-5 in conference play with the win.
• No.
23 Radford claimed the 2015 Big South Baseball Championship with a
5-4 win over Coastal Carolina. Catcher Josh Reavis continued to lead
the way for the Highlanders with a 2-for-4 night at the plate that
included a walk, one run scored and one driven in. Radford as a team
had 10 base hits with Coastal Carolina recording five, although
neither team had an extra-base knock. In addition, both teams went
with a Johnny Wholestaff approach as three and four pitchers were
used respectively for the two teams to close out the tournament.
• Connor
Sitz tossed a no hitter over Bowling Green to lead Ohio to a 6-0 win
and a spot in the MAC Championsip game on Sunday. Left fielder Mitch
Longo and catcher Cody Gaertner each had three hits, accounting for
nearly half (13) of the Bobcats hits on the day.
• Pepperdine
will advance to their second straight NCAA Tournament as they beat
Loyola Marymount 4-2 and won the West Coast Conference tournament
title. Matt Gelalich was one of three Pepperdine players to hit solo
homers, and his RBI single in the eighth broke a 2-2 tie and proved
to be the difference. Starting pitcher Chandler Blanchard struck out
four over 7 1/3 innings to pick up the win.
• The
Missouri Valley Conference Championship game will be played on Sunday
due to storms in the Wichita, Kan., area on Saturday.
• In
addition to Bradley facing Missouri State in the MVC, here are the
rest of the matchups scheduled to determine the 14 remaining
automatic bids:
-
Houston
vs. East Carolina (American Athletic)
-
Florida
State vs. N.C. State (ACC)
-
Oklahoma
State vs. Texas (Big 12)
-
St.
John's vs. Creighton (Big East)
-
Michigan
vs. Maryland (Big Ten)
-
UAB
vs. Florida International (Conference USA)
-
Ohio
vs. Ball State (Mid-American)
-
New
Mexico vs. San Diego State (Mountain West)
-
Bryant
vs. Sacred Heart (Northeast)
-
Mercer
vs. Samford (Southern)
-
Vanderbilt
vs. Florida (SEC)
-
Louisiana
vs. South Alabama (Sun Belt)
-
Seattle
vs. Bakersfield (Western Athletic)