NCAA Baseball Tournament Projection: Is Vanderbilt a National Seed?

With nearly two months of regular season play, the field of contenders for the NCAA Baseball Tournament are starting to come into focus.

Vanderbilt pitcher Sawyer Hawks, left, warms ups before a NCAA college baseball game against Tennessee Tech at Hawkins Field Tuesday, Feb. 25, 2025, in Nashville, Tenn. | Mark Zaleski / The Tennessean / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

The men and women NCAA Tournaments are in full swing and everyone from bracketology experts to casual fans are realizing how hard it is to predict what will happen. But it sure is fun.

What adds to the excitement is the months of bracket predictions, identifying who’s in, who’s out, who’s on the bubble and who needs a miracle (looking at you Arkansas) to be one of the teams playing in the tournament. Nearly every college team sport has a playoff and whenever there’s a cutoff line, there will be controversy and drama around the last teams in and last teams out.

NCAA baseball is no different and the start of the NCAA Baseball Tournament is approaching on the horizon (it’s blotted out by the current March Madness, but it’s there). However, there aren’t nearly as many bracket predictions for baseball as there are for basketball. So, I figure why not throw my hat into the ring.

What follows is my best guess about what the 64-team NCAA Baseball Tournament bracket would look like if the tournament started now. So, I used the current top 25 rankings and current conference standings. I pulled the 16 national seeds from the top 25 list and then identified the current conference champions who would automatically qualify for the tournament. That left me with roughly 15 at-large bids to handout, which was not easy.

Now, before we get to the bracket, let’s understand two things: 1) This is my first attempt at this and probably some things are wrong (like I doubt Hawaii will play in an Auburn, Ala. regional, but for now there's really not a good place to put it); and 2) A lot of this will change. There’s still a lot of games left to be played and some of the current conference leaders won’t be leading in the end.

With those disclaimers done, here’s my NCAA Baseball Tournament Projection 1.0:

NCAA Baseball Tournament Projection - Field of 64

Knoxville Regional

(1) Tennessee
Richmond
Creighton*
St. Thomas*

Winston-Salem Region

(16) Wake Forest
Dallas Baptist*
West Virginia
Central Connecticut *

Fayettville Regional

(2) Arkansas
Kansas State
High Point*
Missouri State*

Oxford Regional

(15) Ole Miss
Louisville
Duke
Austin Peay*

Athens Regional

(3) Georgia
Coastal Carolina
Utah Valley*
College of Charleston*

Nashville Regional

(14) Vanderbilt
UC Irvine
East Tennessee State*
Tennessee Tech*

Tallahassee Regional

(4) Florida State*
Florida
Florida Atlantic
Bethune-Cookman*

Hattiesburg Regional

(13) Southern Miss*
Stanford
Arizona State
Holy Cross*

Corvallis Regional

(5) Oregon State
UC Santa Barbara
Southern California
Portland*

Tuscaloosa Regional

(12) Alabama
North Carolina
NC State
Wright State*

Clemson Regional

(6) Clemson
South Carolina
East Carolina*
Davidson*

Auburn Regional

(11) Auburn
Troy
Hawaii
Ball State*

Austin Regional

(7) Texas
Mississippi State
Fairfield*
UT Rio Grande*

Eugene Regional

(10) Oregon
Arizona*
San Jose State*
Cal Poly*

Baton Rogue Regional

(8) LSU
Georgia Tech
McNeese
New Jersey Tech*

Norman Regional

(9) Oklahoma
UCLA
TCU
Pennsylvania*

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Last Four In

• Southern California
• Mississippi State
• Florida Atlantic
• McNeese

First Four Out

• UTSA
• Michigan State
• Florida International
• Kansas

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2025 NCAA Division I Baseball Postseason Schedule

2025 SEC Tournament: May 20-25, 2025 , at Hoover Metropolitan Stadium Hoover, Ala.Selection show: May 26 at 11 p.m. CT, ESPN2 or ESPNU
Regionals: May 30-June 2
Super Regionals: June 6-9
Men's College World Series: Begins June 13 at Charles Schwab Field Omaha in Omaha, Neb.
Finals: June 21-22/23