OMAHA, Neb. (AP) 鈥� The Southeastern Conference has a record five teams in the College World Series, and the last six national champions hail from the conference.
But it鈥檚 not just the same old, same old this year, not with Troy (38-30) and West Virginia (45-15) squaring off in Friday鈥檚 opener as first-time participants on college baseball’s biggest stage. North Carolina (50-12-1) plays Mississippi (41-21) in the other Bracket 1 game at Charles Schwab Field.
Play begins in the all-SEC Bracket 2 on Saturday with Oklahoma (38-22) meeting Alabama (42-19) and Georgia (51-12) facing Texas (45-13).
SEC dominance in baseball dates to the 1990s, long before the professionalization of college sports with name, image and likeness opportunities and revenue sharing. A popular belief was that the start of NIL in 2021 would make access to the CWS, always difficult for teams outside the power conferences, even more so for them.
After Cal State Fullerton reached Omaha in 2017, there wasn’t another mid-major in the field of eight until Oral Roberts in 2023. Last year, Murray State and Coastal Carolina made it, and Coastal got to the finals.
Troy, which received one of the last four at-large bids for the 64-team NCAA Tournament, carries the flag for the little guys this year.
Just don’t call the Trojans a Cinderella.
鈥淵eah, the crowd loves the Cinderella story, but us in the locker room and as a staff, we don鈥檛 really love that term,鈥� said Jabe Boroff, who has hit six of his 11 home runs in the last five games. 鈥淲e don鈥檛 really consider ourselves that. We know what type of firepower and talent we have in this locker room. It鈥檚 almost like a sour taste to hear Cinderella story.鈥�
Troy has been aiming toward the CWS since coach Skylar Meade was hired five years ago from South Carolina, where he was pitching coach for four seasons. The Trojans, by design, played the toughest nonconference schedule in the country this season and sixth-toughest overall. They are the first 30-loss team to make the CWS, but that’s partly because they were, in Meade’s words, an 鈥渉onorary member of the SEC.鈥�
They went 4-4 against SEC teams with all but one of those games on the road. They have wins over fellow CWS teams Georgia and Alabama, and they outscored host Florida 26-13 over two games in regionals.
Meade said there are three critical pieces to his team’s success. Many of the Division I transfers who came in were underutilized at their previous schools and have thrived. He and his staff identified high school recruits overlooked by SEC schools who could be developed into stars, like Sun Belt Conference player of the year Jimmy Janicki. Teammates also developed strong bonds from playing such an ambitious schedule and overcoming adversity.
鈥淚f you do that, then runs such as this are actually possible,鈥� Meade said. 鈥淚 think without it, they鈥檙e not. You can鈥檛 just be a bunch of nomads that come together. You can maybe do that in the SEC. If you just procure the best-of-the-best talent and you have the elite coaching you have in there, it can happen, I believe. But I think for everyone else, you have to have a lot of pieces gelled together in the right way.鈥�
Been there, done that
A total of 23 different schools have filled the combined 24 CWS spots since 2024. North Carolina is the only one to make it twice. Coach Scott Forbes doesn’t see that as much of an advantage because there are only two players left from the 2024 team that went 1-2 in Omaha.
Forbes said he’s better prepared this time. He showed his players documentaries about Super Bowl teams that got caught up in distractions around the event and lost but won in their second Super Bowl because they knew how to handle the atmosphere.
Look who’s back
Mississippi is back for the first time since it won the 2022 national championship. So is Hunter Elliott, who as a freshman started the Rebels’ title-clinching game against Oklahoma and pitched a strong 6 2/3 innings. Elliott missed most of the 2023 season and all of 2024 with an elbow injury. He’s been the No. 1 starter for all but one series this season. Coach Mike Bianco announced Taylor Rabe would start against the Tar Heels.
The SEC bracket
The NCAA has never re-seeded teams for the CWS, and this year that has created a significant power imbalance between the brackets.
Bracket 1 has national seeds in No. 5 North Carolina and No. 16 West Virginia. Bracket 2 has No. 3 Georgia, No. 6 Texas and No. 7 Alabama.
Oklahoma’s Justin Lebron has no gripe. 鈥淵ou鈥檙e going to be in tough moments throughout the season,” he said, 鈥渟o it will really come out in the postseason.鈥�
Alabama won two of three at Oklahoma in April. Texas and Georgia haven’t met since the Longhorns swept the Bulldogs in Austin in April 2025.
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