What does Ole Miss baseball need to get a national seed?
OXFORD — Ole Miss should feel good about its SEC West title. It should feel good about being the No. 2 seed in the SEC Tournament.
It should feel good about its program-record 42 regular season victories.
But how should the fourth-ranked Rebels feel about their pursuit of a national seed in the NCAA Tournament as they prepare to face Auburn in the conference tournament Wednesday (SEC Network) in Hoover?
“I’d say they’re pretty much a lock at this point, sitting at 18-12 in the conference with a top-10 RPI, a lot of top-50 wins, top-25 wins. Those metrics are very favorable to them,” said Aaron Fitt, editor and national writer for D1Baseball.com. “They’ve got all the things you really need on the resume. A spot or two up in the RPI might be nice but I feel it’s a national-seed resume regardless.”
Ole Miss (42-14, 18-12 SEC) bolstered that resume when it held on for a 10-8 victory over Alabama on Saturday, which allowed the Rebels to clinch a division title. On Monday, Mike Bianco announced his ace Ryan Rolison would start the opening game of the conference tournament against the Tigers, who were swept in Oxford a few weeks ago.
As of Monday, Ole Miss sat at No. 9 in Warren Nolan’s RPI ratings. Baseball
America national writer Teddy Cahill believes the Rebels are in a good spot when it comes to a national seed.
A 0-2 week in Hoover would obviously create some nervousness among the Ole Miss faithful but Cahill doesn’t think the Rebels have to do much more than that.
“I don’t think (Ole Miss is) in a position where they need to be playing on Saturday necessarily,” Cahill said. “I mean, just winning one of these games in Hoover I feel like should pretty well do it.”
Why is a national seed so important for Ole Miss? Well, it would put a regional and a potential super regional in Oxford. The Rebels are 28-4 at home this season with no opponent winning more than once in Oxford-University Stadium.
So it would be a promising position for Ole Miss, which hasn’t come close to the College World Series since its 2014 appearance, having gone 0-4 in the NCAA Tournament since that year.
Since both Cahill and Fitt both think the Rebels don’t have to do too much to lock up one of those national seeds this week, let’s look at the worst-case scenario.
If Ole Miss does go 0-2 in Hoover, which teams would it have to watch out for?
“I would say somebody in the ACC, like Clemson or Florida State,” Fitt said. “Those are teams that had pretty good regular seasons, Right now, those are teams we have behind Ole Miss in the pecking order but not way behind.”
Cahill mentioned Florida State as well, along with other programs such as Texas Tech, Texas, and, to a lesser extent, Minnesota.
As far as the SEC goes, Florida, Georgia and Arkansas appear to be in line for national seeds as well, which could give the conference four of the eight available national seeds.
“I feel like Ole Miss isn’t the most vulnerable of the current teams you’re looking at for the top eight,” Cahill said. “Given that they beat Arkansas, finished ahead of Arkansas in the standings . ... I feel like they’re in a better sport than the Razorbacks despite not having the RPI Arkansas does.”