(Photo: IUHoosiers.com)

The Hoosiers learned their 2019 NCAA Baseball tournament destiny today in the full bracket reveal on ESPNU. Selected as a 2-seed, Indiana baseball will be taking on UIC, Illinois State, and the Cardinals in the Louisville regional site. Regional games take place between May 31st and June 3rd with Indiana’s first game against 3-seed Illinois State will be taking place Friday May 31st at 2pm EST on ESPN3 (ESPN’s online streaming service). Since Indiana did not win the conference tournament, the Hoosiers were chosen to be one of the remaining at-large bids for the post-season tournament.

The Hoosiers found out yesterday that they would not be one of the sixteen host sites selected.

The Louisville regional is paired up with the Greenville regional, meaning that the winners of each regional will play against each other in a Super Regional match. The Greenville regional features East Carolina University (host), NC State, Campbell, and Quinnipiac.

First year head coach and Big Ten coach of the year Jeff Mercer is seeking better luck for the Hoosiers this year compared to just one year ago. Last year in the 2018 NCAA Baseball Tournament, the Hoosiers were selected in the Austin, Texas regional site also as a two-seed. After going 2-2 against #25 Texas A&M (twice), #14 Texas, and Texas Southern, the Hoosiers unfortunately did not advance out of the Austin regional.

Of course, Jeff Mercer was with Wright State last year. The fourth-seeded Raiders won the Horizon League conference tournament to get an automatic berth to the 2018 NCAA tournament, but they had to fly cross country to play in their assigned Stanford regional. With the travel and time-adjustment working them, the Raiders were quickly eliminated from the regional with an 0-2 record.

The Hoosiers have a full week’s worth of rest after their uninspiring performance at Omaha where they fell 0-2 as the number one seed. Can Jeff Mercer recalibrate the home-run hitting Hoosiers and find the magic that led them to a Big Ten regular season championship? Perhaps, this was all part of the plan to get Indiana baseball some much needed rest, as many RPI predictors believed that the Hoosiers were solidly in the NCAA tournament as a two-seed irrespective of what happened in Omaha. Regardless, the Hoosiers begin play this Friday, May 31st.

The Hoosiers have only made the College World Series once in the history of their program, which was in 2013 led by Kyle Schwarber. Indiana defeated Louisville in the first round of the College World Series, but subsequently lost to Mississippi State and Oregon State.

Kyle Schwarber in his Hoosier basketball warm-ups. Photo credit to the Indiana Baseball instagram page. #Cubs #iubase x #iubb pic.twitter.com/c1FAAwZpsY — IndianaHQ (@IndianaHQ) May 27, 2019

Full Louisville Regional

BREAKING: Indiana Hoosier baseball is selected as a 2️⃣ seed in the Louisville Regional. They will face Illinois State first (Friday 2pm on ESPN 3) #iubase #CWS



Louisville Regional:



1️⃣ Louisville

2️⃣ Indiana

3️⃣ Illinois State

4️⃣ UIC — IndianaHQ (@IndianaHQ) May 27, 2019

The Louisville regional is matched up with the Greenville regional hosted by ECU. Full 8 teams below #iubase #CWS pic.twitter.com/8nPy3DkyrB — IndianaHQ (@IndianaHQ) May 27, 2019

Full 2019 NCAA Bracket

Format of the 2019 NCAA Baseball Tournament

Regionals (Friday, May 31st – Monday, June 3rd): Each of the 16 host sites will have a seperate double-elimination bracket featuring four teams. One team will advance from the group.

(Friday, May 31st – Monday, June 3rd): Each of the 16 host sites will have a seperate double-elimination bracket featuring four teams. One team will advance from the group. Super Regionals (Friday, June 7th – Monday, June 10th): Teams will play a best of three series against another regional winner.

(Friday, June 7th – Monday, June 10th): Teams will play a best of three series against another regional winner. College World Series (Saturday, June 15th – Wednesday, June 26th): The remaining 8 teams are split into two groups of 4-teams. The teams will again go into a double-elimination bracket. The advancing team of each bracket will be in the College World Series finals and compete in a final best of three series.

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