College baseball is a funny sport. While the regular season has come and gone, 64 teams still have a shot to win the Men's College World Series. Being one of the eight teams to get to Omaha each year is a huge deal, but only one can be crowned a champion. In the weeks before a national champion is even decided, we will have to sift our ways through the regionals first and then the super regionals.
With the 64-team field being decided on Memorial Day, we need to keep close tabs on who the 16 regional hosts are and who could be vulnerable for an early elimination. With the 16 regional hosts getting to play in front of the home crowd for as many games as they need to come out of the double elimination tournament, one would think everyone capitalizes on this massive advantage. Not so fast!
How many times has a regional host not advanced to a Super Regional?
Since 1999, the regional host advances to the super regionals 68.8 percent of the time. Home-field advantage is a real thing, as the regional host wins more than three-quarters of their host games in this format. That is about how often it is for a regional host to be a Men's College World Series participant and a national champion. It is far from a foregone conclusion that one gets to Omaha.
Allow me to take a few minutes to unpack this just a bit further when it comes to making it to Omaha.
Why not all college baseball regional hosts advance to next round
For those who need a bit of a stage setter, here are the 16 regional host sites for this year's field.
- Athens, Georgia – Georgia (42-15)
- Auburn, Alabama – Auburn (38-18)
- Austin, Texas – Texas (42-12)
- Baton Rouge, Louisiana – LSU (43-14)
- Chapel Hill, North Carolina – North Carolina (42-12)
- Clemson, South Carolina – Clemson (44-16)
- Conway, South Carolina – Coastal Carolina (48-11)
- Corvallis, Oregon – Oregon State (41-12-1)
- Eugene, Oregon – Oregon (42-14)
- Fayetteville, Arkansas – Arkansas (43-13)
- Hattiesburg, Mississippi – Southern Mississippi (44-14)
- Knoxville, Tennessee – Tennessee (43-16)
- Los Angeles, California – UCLA (42-16)
- Nashville, Tennessee – Vanderbilt (42-16)
- Oxford, Mississippi – Ole Miss (40-19)
- Tallahassee, Florida – Florida State (38-14)
So if we were to use the data in place, expect for five or six of these regional hosts to not make it through to the super regionals. The reasoning for this is in large part the fickle nature of a game of baseball. It may be different at lower levels, but in MLB, the best teams still lose 20 percent of the time and the worst clubs still win 20 percent of their games. It is the middle 60 percent where it is decided.
Sometimes a No. 2 seed could be better equipped to get past the host seed in their region. Other times, a team of destiny just catches fire. What I think is very important in all this is what happens when the No. 1 seed loses to a No. 4 seed right from the jump. It puts the host team very much behind the eight ball, having to win multiple must-win games at home to avoid being embarrassed as a host.
It is all about the matchups, the teams that are playing with momentum, as well as a stroke of luck.