by Carl James • @jovian34 • May 26

Hoosiers maintain 2-seed

Great day of wins from Indiana’s past opponents maintained strength of schedule. However two other Midwest teams are locks for 2-seeds so regional assignments are not clear. Multiple model runs throughout the day had the Hoosiers going to multiple locations but circling right back to Louisville in this version. However, I think the human touch of the NCAA Committee would switch Indiana State and Indiana, placing the Hoosiers in Starkville. Yes. The one in Mississippi. Wouldn’t that be a story?

Western Adjustment re-tooled

I re-wrote the western adjustment to be responsive to each western team’s RPI numbers and not just be a blanket increase in rank. This seems to produce results more in-line with expectations.

Automatic Bids

Many more clinched. It is possible that teams I have listed as 4-seeds have been eliminated since no clinch auto bids are assumed to be the top RPI team in the league until clinched and I haven’t gone conference by conference.

Stolen Bids

Bubble teams rejoice. Stolen bid potential is way down now and no bids have been stolen yet.

Steal Potential by Conference:

POTENTIAL STEALS REMAINING: 1. Big Ten (champ game will be at-large/stealer) 2. Conference USA (FAU cruising so far, but a champ game loss = steal) 3. American Athletic (Cincy a threat to steal vs at-large UCONN) 4. Big 12 (TCU last stealer left in loser's bracket)

About the Model

Bracket predictions are all over the place now on just about any site that covers national Division I College baseball. This field is different. I am not “projecting” with this bracket. This is if the committee had to put the field together today. This is generated by a computer program that I wrote to rank the teams and take multiple factors like geography into account when assigning teams to regionals. This is results-based, using an approximation of techniques to try an match the priorities the NCAA committee showed in the 2018 tournament selection.

Hosts by conference:

SEC: 6, Pac-12: 3, Big 12: 3, ACC: 3, and American: 1

Lasts in/firsts out:

Some big names are the last teams in. Should the stolen bids not happen, they may all get in.

Last Four in: 1. FLORIDA 2. ARIZONA 3. FLORIDA STATE 4. DUKE First Four out: 1. UC IRVINE 2. SOUTHERN MISS 3. VCU 4. MINNESOTA