The NCAA baseball tournament bracket is set with UCLA as the top seed, an SEC-heavy feel and some legitimate gripes from contenders just out of the 64-team field.
The Bruins are one of four teams from the Big Ten, though three were named as regional hosts. That’s nothing compared to the SEC, which has an NCAA-best seven teams hosting regional games and placed 12 teams in the field overall.
One SEC team not in the bracket is Vanderbilt, which had its long tournament streak snapped after an uncharacteristically poor regular season.
The field’s biggest snub might be Mercer, which finished 28th in RPI, the highest ranking of any team to miss the field in tournament history.
Regional play begins on Friday. The winners of the 16 regions advance to the best-of-three super regional round. The College World Series begins on June 12 in Omaha, Nebraska.
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Led by UCLA and the SEC, here are the biggest winners and losers from the reveal of the baseball bracket:
UCLA shortstop Roch Cholowsky throws to first base against Arkansas during the 2025 College World Series at Charles Schwab Field.
Winners
UCLA: UCLA is the tournament’s top overall seed after a dominant 51-6 run through the regular season that saw the Bruins drop just one game on the road. After a slight lull early this month in matchups against Oregon and Washington, the Bruins rebounded to capture the Big Ten tournament with wins against Purdue, Southern California and No. 11 Oregon. UCLA is led by star shortstop Roch Cholowsky, who repeated as the Big Ten Player of the Year thanks to his .329 batting average, team-best 21 home runs and 1.123 OPS.
SEC: Seven of the 16 regional hosts hail from the nation’s top baseball conference: No. 3 Georgia, No. 4 Auburn, No. 6 Texas, No. 7 Alabama, No. 8 Florida, No. 12 Texas A&M and No. 14 Mississippi State. This comes after another impressive regular season that saw the SEC take up four of the top seven and seven of the top 14 spots in the final RPI rankings.
REGIONAL HOSTS: Florida State is a regional host for a record 38th time. This is the 31st time as a host for Texas. But a few other regional hosts are making history, or at least snapping an extended drought. After a memorable regular season, No. 15 Kansas will host for the first time in program history. No. 16 West Virginia is hosting for the first time since 2019 and the second time overall. And despite coming up short in the Big Ten semifinals to Oregon, No. 13 Nebraska was picked as a regional host for the first time since 2008.
Georgia's Tre Phelps tosses confetti as Georgia Bulldogs head coach Wes Johnson is interviewed after the Bulldogs beat Arkansas in the SEC tournament championship game at Hoover Metropolitan Stadium on Sunday in Hoover, Ala.
Losers
ARKANSAS: The one SEC team with a possible gripe for not being selected as a regional host is Arkansas, which posted 18 Quad 1 regular-season wins, double Mississippi State’s total, and reached the conference championship game before getting run-ruled by Georgia. This is only the second time in the past nine seasons the Razorbacks have not hosted a regional. That should leave Arkansas with plenty of motivation in the Lawrence regional alongside Kansas, underrated Missouri State and Northeastern.
NORTH CAROLINA: While the No. 5 overall seed in the bracket, the Tar Heels might’ve drawn the toughest regional group of any host in Tennessee, East Carolina and Virginia Commonwealth. The Volunteers went 7-2 down the stretch of the regular season before losing to the Razorbacks in the second round of the SEC tournament. ECU captured the American tournament for the second year in a row after blanking Texas-San Antonio in the title game. And VCU was picked eighth in the preseason Atlantic 10 poll but won the conference title by outslugging Rhode Island 18-16 in the final.
SOUTHERN MISS: Southern Miss doesn’t have it easy, either, after being named a regional host for consecutive seasons row for the first time in program history. The Golden Eagles have advanced out the regional weekend three times, most recently in 2023, and made the College World Series once, in 2009. To get back there, they’ll need to navigate through Virginia, Atlantic Sun champion Jacksonville State and Ohio Valley winner Arkansas-Little Rock. The Cavaliers had an up-and-down year against one of the nation’s toughest schedules but are back in the tournament under first-year coach Chris Pollard after missing the field in 2025.
BUBBLE TEAMS: Texas State was a slight surprise as the third seed in the College Station regional after finishing tied for sixth in the Sun Belt. Kentucky made the West Virginia regional despite going 13-17 in the SEC. A few teams have legitimate complaints over being left out, including Mercer, TCU and Texas-San Antonio. Mercer went 44-15 in the regular season but was stunned twice by The Citadel in the Southern tournament. TCU was undone by an 11-16 mark in Quad 1 games.
VANDERBILT: The Commodores were not seen as a potential tournament team after going 33-25 overall, 14-16 in SEC play and finishing 72nd in RPI. This is still a stunning absence from the field: Vanderbilt had made every tournament since 2006, reaching the College World Series five times, finishing as national runner-up twice and winning it all in 2014 and 2019.
