Now that the Nebraska baseball team has officially locked down a regional hosting site for the NCAA Tournament, it's time to take a few last-minute guesses at just who might be joining the Huskers in Lincoln. The NCAA will announce the host cities and which teams are in which regionals at 11 am on Monday. Still, while there isn't an official announcement just yet, there are hints and ideas about where the selection committee might send some teams.
One school that's gotten mentioned more often than not is the Arkansas Razorbacks. Dave Van Horn's squad was competing to host their own regional, but those dreams were dashed on Sunday night. Considering the SEC power likely nearly made the cut, they'll be a high No. 2 seed. It's expected the Cornhuskers will be among the lower regional seeds. So NU vs Arkansas could be a match made in heaven with built-in drama.
While Van Horn returning to Nebraska would make for good television, it's a safe bet that Husker fans would rather not face the possibility of his squad topping his old school once again. If the NCAA wants an SEC school to come to Lincoln, but Arkansas isn't rated right, Ole Miss could be that team.
The Rebels were another team on the cusp of earning a host site, but at No. 21 RPI, they didn't get it done. One would hope the Huskers got a good enough seed that they don't have a difficult regional road.
Nebraska baseball now waits to see if Arkansas or Ole Miss lands in Lincoln
Since schools can’t be paired with foes from the same conference, that eliminates USC as a possibility, geographical considerations can still be a factor. Oregon State and Wake Forest are other potential candidates. Both of those teams would be extremely interesting 2-seeds considering their long college baseball histories.
On Sunday morning, D1Baseball took a swing at predicting the entire NCAA Tournament field. The site did predict Nebraska to host a regional. It also picked Ole Miss, Liberty, and South Dakota State as the other teams coming to town.
Of course, it's worth noting that the site also had Arkansas pegged as a regional host. With that prediction miss, it's safe to assume everything else will shift a bit. Still, those no. 3 and no. 4 teams would be interesting enough simply because they could provide a fairly straightforward path to the super regional should Nebraska manage to hold serve at Haymarket Park.
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