2024 NCAA Baseball Tournament Bracket: Projected Field Of 64 (May 15)
With less than two weeks until Selection Monday, college baseball’s regular season has reached its fever pitch. Most conferences have just one weekend of play remaining before the start of their tournaments. Meanwhile, the first automatic bid will be handed out this weekend in the Ivy League. The Patriot League championship series will also be completed by this time next week.
Still, at this time of the season, there is some projection involved with building a Field of 64. This is meant to illustrate what the tournament would look like on Selection Monday, not how it would be seeded if it started tomorrow.
You can find this week’s Bubble Watch here.
2024 NCAA Baseball Bracket
| PROJECTED FIELD OF 64 | ||||
| Lexington, Ky. | Santa Barbara, Calif. | |||
| 1. (1) Kentucky^* | 1. (16) UC Santa Barbara^* | |||
| 2. UConn* | 2. Arizona | |||
| 3. Virginia Tech | 3. South Carolina | |||
| 4. North Dakota State* | 4. Fresno State* | |||
| Chapel Hill, N.C. | Stillwater, Okla. | |||
| 1. (2) North Carolina^* | 1. (15) Oklahoma State^ | |||
| 2. UNC Wilmington* | 2. Mississippi State | |||
| 3. UNC Greensboro* | 3. Oregon | |||
| 4. Fairfield* | 4. Lamar* | |||
| Knoxville, Tenn. | Charlottesville, Va. | |||
| 1. (3) Tennessee^ | 1. (14) Virginia^ | |||
| 2. Louisiana Tech* | 2. West Virginia | |||
| 3. Indiana | 3. Vanderbilt | |||
| 4. Wright State* | 4. Columbia* | |||
| College Station, Texas | Corvallis, Ore. | |||
| 1. (4) Texas A&M^ | 1. (13) Oregon State^* | |||
| 2. Louisiana* | 2. UC Irvine | |||
| 3. TCU | 3. Xavier | |||
| 4. Army* | 4. Grand Canyon* | |||
| Fayetteville, Ark. | Terre Haute, Ind. | |||
| 1. (5) Arkansas^ | 1. (12) Indiana State^* | |||
| 2. Nebraska* | 2. NC State | |||
| 3. Kansas State | 3. Cincinnati | |||
| 4. Saint Louis* | 4. Bowling Green State* | |||
| Clemson, S.C. | Greenville, N.C. | |||
| 1. (6) Clemson^ | 1. (11) East Carolina^* | |||
| 2. San Diego* | 2. Duke | |||
| 3. James Madison | 3. Coastal Carolina | |||
| 4. Austin Peay State* | 4. High Point* | |||
| Tallahassee, Fla. | Athens, Ga. | |||
| 1. (7) Florida State^ | 1. (10) Georgia^ | |||
| 2. Alabama | 2. Southern Miss | |||
| 3. UCF | 3. Georgia Tech | |||
| 4. Florida A&M* | 4. Bryant* | |||
| Norman, Okla. | Winston-Salem, N.C. | |||
| 1. (8) Oklahoma^* | 1. (9) Wake Forest^ | |||
| 2. Dallas Baptist | 2. Texas | |||
| 3. Northeastern | 3. Troy | |||
| 4. Arkansas-Little Rock* | 4. Sacred Heart* | |||
* denotes automatic bid
^ denotes regional host
Last Four In
61. Virginia Tech
62. James Madison
63. Indiana
64. UCF
First Four Out
65. St. John’s
66. Louisville
67. LSU
68. Illinois
Next Four Out
69. Charleston
70. Mississippi
71. Kansas
72. California
When does the NCAA baseball bracket come out?
The full field of 64 is released on Monday, May 27 at 12 p.m. ET, an event commonly referred to as “Selection Monday.” The 2024 NCAA Tournament is set to begin later that week with regionals on Friday, May 31. That sets the path to the 2024 Men’s College World Series, which begins Friday, June 14.
Some notes about the field
One change on the host line this week. Oklahoma State moves up to the host line after an abbreviated sweep of Texas Tech pushed it up to No. 17 in RPI. The Cowboys have a solid overall resume, but cannot be considered safe on the host line. Competition for the last couple spots remains fierce. Mississippi State and NC State are firmly in the mix today and I don’t think Arizona is out of it, though the Wildcats might just end up swapping spots with Oregon State if they close strong enough to get on the host line.
The top-eight seed race is suddenly much more interesting. I wrote that I was “bored” by the top-eight seed race for the last two weeks. No longer. Florida State has lost three of its last four games and East Carolina has lost four straight. That, combined with surges from Oklahoma and Wake Forest, has me very interested now. I moved Oklahoma up—the RPI (16) doesn’t suggest the Sooners belong, but they’re the Big 12 champs, have 18 wins in quads 1 and 2 and have played a top-10 schedule. That’s a strong combination.
I left out Florida State this week, but it’s going to be tight. Wake Forest won the head-to-head series and is closing hard, but Florida State faces an easier final weekend (home against Georgia Tech vs. a road series at NC State). I think if the Seminoles take care of business this weekend and Wake stumbles on the road (what I view to be the likeliest outcomes), Florida State’s better positioning in the ACC standings would push it over the top. But that spot probably will come down to how the teams fare not only this weekend, but also in the ACC Tournament.
The bubble is difficult to read today. That’s normal, we’ll get more clarity in the next 10 days. But know that this projection is just that—a projection—and some bubble decisions were made based on what I think will happen this weekend. I have Florida out and off the bubble because I am projecting a series loss at Georgia and it not reaching the SEC Tournament semifinals. If those two things come to pass, it will not finish the season with a winning record and will be ineligible for the postseason. I have LSU winning its series against Ole Miss, but not sweeping, meaning both teams finish with 12 SEC wins. While I think their resumes are still compelling with only 12 SEC wins, there’s strong precedent that SEC teams need 13 conference wins to get at-large bids.
