Where Tennessee baseball landed in latest NCAA Tournament projections
· Yahoo Sports
Tennessee baseball’s NCAA Tournament profile may have taken a slight dip after losing two games at Kentucky, but the Vols are still in position for another regional berth.
Tennessee’s season to this point has been hard to define, with series wins against probable national seeds showing its potential but questions remaining of its ability to sustain that level. With only seven games left in the regular season, Tennessee (32-17, 11-13 SEC) is putting the final touches on its postseason resume.
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The Vols’ best remaining chance to improve their seed will be a three-game series against No. 4 Texas (36-10, 15-8), the SEC’s highest-ranked team. Game 1 at Lindsey Nelson Stadium is May 8 (6:30 p.m., SEC Network+), followed by Game 2 on May 9 (6 p.m., SEC Network+) and the series finale on May 10 (noon, ESPN2).
“It's a very balanced group and very competitive, but that's what the SEC is,” Tennessee coach Josh Elander said of the Longhorns. “… It's another really, really good opponent at home in Knoxville, and we're excited for the challenge."
Ahead of Tennessee’s penultimate SEC series, here’s where it stands in recent NCAA Tournament projections:
Where could Tennessee play in a regional?
The Vols were a consensus No. 2 seed before the Kentucky series, but most projections now consider them a No. 3 seed.
D1baseball and Baseball America both have Tennessee headed to Atlanta as the No. 3 seed in a regional hosted by No. 2 overall seed Georgia Tech. USA TODAY, meanwhile, projects the Vols to Los Angeles as the third seed in No. 1 overall seed UCLA’s regional, and On3 also has the Vols headed to L.A. but instead playing at Southern Cal.
The Tennessean’s Aria Gerson still has the Vols as the second seed in the Chapel Hill regional, hosted by North Carolina.
All those projections include at least 12 SEC teams, and Baseball America added a 13th with Vanderbilt as the last team in.
How many wins Tennessee needs for an NCAA Tournament bid
Even a so-so finish to the season should be enough for the Vols to make the NCAA Tournament. They moved off the bubble a few weeks ago after spending time there earlier in the season, and with 11 SEC wins they are just three away from the magic number of 14 (no team with a 14-16 or better SEC record has missed the tournament since 2017).
Splitting their final two weekend series, or even just avoiding two sweeps and performing well at the SEC Tournament, would likely be enough to punch their ticket to a regional.
Tennessee’s RPI stands at No. 35 nationally after a May 5 win over Presbyterian, with the potential for a boost with upcoming Quadrant 1 opportunities against Texas (No. 3 in RPI) and Oklahoma (No. 20). The Vols are 10-8 in Quad 1 games and 1-5 in Quad 2.
Tennessee’s SEC Tournament seeding
Tennessee is tied with Kentucky for 11th in the SEC standings with six games to go. If the conference tournament began this week, the Vols would be the No. 12 seed and play Vanderbilt, the No. 13 seed, in the first round with a five-game path to the title.
“We don’t really try to look at that too much,” Vols first baseman Levi Clark said.
To earn a first-round bye with a top eight seed, Tennessee would have to make up two games on one of three squads tied at 13-11 in conference play (Alabama, Arkansas and Florida). Ole Miss and Oklahoma are also ahead at 12-12 in a tie for ninth.
Emmett Siegel covers Tennessee baseball for Knox News. Email: [email protected]; X: @EmmettSiegel_
This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: How many wins Tennessee baseball needs to make the NCAA Tournament