Fans Grumpy Over Arkansas Razorbacks' No. 2 Seed Projection Need to Hang Tight

Hogs reach soft part of schedule, have advantage with selection committee

Arkansas Razorbacks infielders Nolan Souza and Camden Kozeal jump in celebration of a 12-4 win over Missouri State at Baum-Walker Stadium, ending a losing streak to the Bears. | Razorback Communications

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — For those watching objectively, it feels like the Arkansas Razorbacks have slowly evolved much closer to what Hogs head coach Dave Van Horn envisioned for his team.

Arkansas emerged from the toughest stretch of schedule it will face all season having gone 8-3 with a 4-2 record against teams that were in the Top 10 when the Razorbacks played them. That stretch includes a 5-3 record against teams expected to host a regional in a few weeks, while also ending a losing streak against a Missouri State team that is the No. 16 RPI team in the country and a projected No. 2 seed.

That's a strong 18 days of baseball. However, along the way, Arkansas fans have had a negative perspective of what went down.

Perhaps they are a little too close to what's going on to see the big picture, or they're just a tad spoiled by success that never seems to end in Fayetteville year after year. One thing that did seem to cause Arkansas fans to prickle up was talk during Tuesday night's broadcast about Missouri State and Arkansas being projected No. 2 seeds in regionals they might not want to draw.

The Bears are currently slated to head to College Station with Texas A&M and the Razorbacks are expected to draw a slot in Talahassee with Florida State. The idea of Arkansas not hosting a regional is a downright offensive thought in the minds of the Hogs' faithful.

It's their right to host a regional every season. That shrine to college baseball where Arkansas plays most spring weekends didn't get built to stay empty once the regular season ends.

And, as much as it might do the Razorbacks a bit of good to go somewhere else to play in the postseason for once, there's a good chance that's not going to happen. Not only does Van Horn have his players, although at a painfully slow rate, starting to peak, but the Razorbacks have hit the one part of the schedule someone might dare describe as soft.

Unless something wildly unexpected happens, the 27 wins the Hogs have desperately scraped together will magically evolve to 32 by this time next week. See, Arkansas heads to Missouri this weekend, a team that is 3-13 over its past 16 games, which includes a loss to Lindenwood along the way.

For those who don't know, Lindenwood is a team that officially moved up from Division II this year after only making it to the playoffs against the likes of Southern Arkansas and Delta State twice in school history. The Tigers are in last place in the SEC with a 3-15 record to accompany a seven-game losing streak.

That's followed by a pair of games against Northwestern State at Baum-Walker to close out the mid-week non-conference games for the year. The 32 games Arkansas should have at that point should easily be enough to lock up a No. 2 seed, but that's not the Hogs' goal.

They want to host just like their fans.

Well, guess what. So does the selection committee, which carries a lot of weight.

Having the luxury of putting games in such a large stadium in an area with plenty of hotels and a long history of hosting is a dream for the selection committee. They deal with so many headaches at some of these places that host.

Even at SEC schools, there are issues that arise. For instance, three years ago, when Kentucky earned the right to host a regional, a lack of hotel rooms forced teams to either book hotels over an hour away or stay the night crammed into dorms.

That doesn't even account for what fans had to face. Some of these small schools that earn bids are a headache also.

Either they have a stadium that's too small, there's not enough restaurants and hotels around, or there's a lot of chaos from not having enough qualified personnel to handle everything that comes with hosting. It often reaches a point where the committee gives the hosting site to someone else in the regional on behalf of the No. 1 seed.

So, if there is any way to justify Arkansas as a No. 1 seed, the selection committee is going to do it. The question is how few wins can the Razorbacks get away with while recent history shows it's OK to give the Hogs the bid.

The answer is 33. If things go as planned, the Razorbacks will be one win away from the 33 wins North Carolina State mustered in 2024 to earn a No. 1 seed in a field with teams that had 50 wins before regionals started.

Beyond the low bar of 33-20, there are numerous instances over the past two years of teams with 36 to 38 wins hosting regionals. The Hogs' final three series include Ole Miss, Oklahoma and Kentucky, with a stop over in the SEC Tournament.

Oklahoma is expected to host at No. 14 with a record of 28-12, Ole Miss is No. 17 at 30-12 and Kentucky is unranked at 26-13 and responsible for 2/3 of Missouri's SEC wins.

It's not hard to imagine Arkansas getting at least one win over each while winning a game in the SEC Tournament. That puts them at 37 wins, which would probably be enough to be the last team chosen to host as a No. 1 seed.

Arkansas would have a ton of wins over teams already hosting, so it would be easily justified. However, the most likely scenario is Arkansas comes away with two wins against at least one of those teams, which raises the bar to 38 wins, a number that has been a basic guarantee of a No. 1 seed out of the SEC for the committee.

So long as the Razorbacks don't have their brains fall out and forget how to play baseball over the next week, the odds of having to go elsewhere as a No. 2 seed are borderline impossible. However, as pessimistic Hogs fans will say, expect the worst to happen.

And it might. Just considering how this team is slowly getting better each week, it doesn't seem to be trending that way.