NCAA Baseball Super Regionals 2015: Full Bracket and Storylines to Watch – Bleacher Report

The intensity kicks up a notch on Friday with the start of this year’s NCAA Baseball Super Regionals. There are 16 teams vying to take home a title, including defending champion Vanderbilt. 

One key storyline that came from regional action was the lack of upsets. Not every No. 1 seed made it through, but 11 of the teams still alive do have that one next to their name, and VCU is the only No. 4 seed taking part in the super regionals. 

It’s a deep and talented field of teams still playing with no clear favorite at this point. Miami had the highest RPI during the regular season and secured its spot in the super regional with a 21-3 win over Columbia one day after being shutout by the Lions. 

Parity is running amok in college baseball, even with the presence of so many top seeds, so nothing is guaranteed to happen when games get underway on Friday. 

Here is the full bracket for the super regionals and top storylines to watch over the weekend. 

Bracket (via NCAA Baseball)

The Super Sixteen!

#RoadToOmaha pic.twitter.com/Ppx3QgD9vX

— NCAA Baseball (@NCAACWS) June 2, 2015

Vanderbilt’s Quest to Repeat

The last team to win consecutive titles was South Carolina in 2010 and 2011. Two Pac-12 teams took the crown in 2012 (Arizona) and 2013 (UCLA) before the SEC got back on top when Vanderbilt won its first championship last year. 

The Commodores have shown no signs of slowing down in their quest to repeat, winning 42 games in the regular season and breezing through their regional with a perfect 3-0 record. The final win was a 21-0 drubbing of Radford that prompted this note from ESPN Stats & Info:

Vanderbilt baseball beat Radford by 21 runs today.

Vanderbilt football won 3 games last season by a COMBINED 18 points.

— ESPN Stats & Info (@ESPNStatsInfo) June 1, 2015

However, Vanderbilt’s regional success came in the comforts of Nashville, Tennessee. It has to travel for the super regional against Illinois, which Adam Sparks of The Tennessean noted has been a problem in the past:

This weekend the defending national champion Commodores will play almost 400 miles from their place of peace in Champaign, Ill., in an attempt to win their first road Super Regional in program history. They have lost both road Super Regional series and posted a 1-4 record in trips to Texas (2004) and Florida State (2010).

Both College World Series berths in Vanderbilt history were earned at home.

Illinois matched Vanderbilt’s 3-0 record in the regionals, though, it didn’t have a dramatic 21-0 win along the way. The Illini did, however, give up seven runs in those three wins.

Vanderbilt head coach told Sparks that his team will have to make adjustments now that it’s leaving its comfort zone:

I don’t think you ever, as a coach, feel like you have everything in place. My feeling with this group is just that I trust their mentality, their heartbeat, their approach more than anything. In saying that, the game sometimes takes swings at you that you’re not ready for and you don’t see coming.

History isn’t on Vanderbilt’s side, but history didn’t prevent the program from winning its first national title last year. The Commodores boast a roster with at least three potential first-round draft picks in Dansby Swanson, Walker Buehler and Carson Fulmer. 

While having so many draftees doesn’t guarantee tournament success, it does speak to how talented Vanderbilt’s roster is and why history won’t dictate what this team does. 

LSU’s Pitching Prowess

One of baseball’s mottos says that momentum is the next day’s starting pitcher. It’s certainly possible to win a game with a lot of runs being scored, but it’s easier if the pitchers are able to take care of business. 

No team has benefited more from great pitching than LSU, which hasn’t given up a run since the seventh inning of its opening game against Lehigh. 

As NCAA.com noted after the regionals, Alex Lange and Jared Poche have led the Tigers to success over the last two games:

In cruising to its 21st regional title, LSU has not given up a run in its past 20 innings. In Saturday’s winners’ bracket game, Alex Lange tossed a complete-game shutout against UNCW, striking out 12 while scattering six hits. Then on Monday, Poche’ followed that performance up with a gem of his own against the Seahawks, going 8.2 innings with six hits and eight strikeouts.

LSU needed Lange and Poche to be on point in those games because UNC-Wilmington pitchers held the Tigers in check with just four runs in two games. 

Andrew Stevenson did help out Poche with a spectacular diving catch on a ball in the gap with a runner on first base in the top of the fourth inning against the Seahawks that turned into a double play. Ron Higgins of The Times-Picayune used that particular play as a mission statement for this year’s LSU team:

It’s that type of never-say-die attitude that has endeared Tigers’ fans to this team.
It plays relentless until the final out, whenever that may be since it has been involved in extra inning game nine times. It through getting its chain yanked by the NCAA as it did Sunday night when it got to the ball park only to have the NCAA cancel the game for a thunderstorm that never showed up.

The Tigers will now take on one of the Cinderella teams left, No. 3 Louisiana-Lafayette, in a series that will be played at LSU’s home field. The Ragin‘ Cajuns have great pitching in their own right, allowing three runs in their last two wins over Houston and Rice. 

With both pitching staffs firing on all cylinders, runs should be at a premium in the series. LSU found exactly what it needed from Lange and Poche when it needed it, and playing in front of a partial home crowd will lead to good things for the Tigers. 

The Rise of Cinderella

Even though Louisiana-Lafayette can make a claim as Cinderella in this year’s NCAA tournament, the slipper perfectly fits VCU right now. The Rams knocked off Dallas Baptist, the No. 1 seed in the regional, twice en route to becoming the only No. 4 seed playing in the super regional. 

But the storybook fantasy goes deeper than that, as NCAA.com noted VCU is just the fifth No. 4 seed since 1999 to win a regional and are in the super regionals for the first time in program history. 

The Associated Press (via The Daily Press) noted in its NCAA tournament recap on June 2 how appropriate VCU‘s win over Dallas Baptist was:

The Rams, who led the nation in being hit by pitches, took the lead for good in the first inning when James Bunn was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded. They never relinquished the margin against one of the nation’s top offenses, and they became just the fifth No. 4 regional seed to reach a Super Regional since the tournament went to its current format in 1999.

While the feel-good story does make for nice headlines, VCU does have its work cut out for it heading into a super regional against Miami. The Hurricanes tempted fate in their regional, getting shutout by Columbia in their third game, but responded in grand fashion with a 21-3 win. 

Miami’s offense was pumping out runs with ease when the regular season ended, scoring 39 runs in the last two games of a series against Georgia Tech, so that 21-run outburst shouldn’t be thought of as an anomaly. 

VCU can’t match the Hurricanes’ offensive firepower, so it will have to rely on timely hitting to support the pitching staff. Dallas Baptist did finish tied for 24th in runs scored this season, so holding it to one run in the regional game is an accomplishment. 

However, Miami was playing at another level by leading the NCAA with 525 runs scored. Morehead State was second with 505, for perspective. 

Cinderella makes for a great story to talk about before the games begin, but eventually the clock strikes midnight and the dream ends. Miami will pummel VCU into submission in this series.

Stats via NCAA.com unless otherwise noted.