NCAA Selects Only Seven Western Teams : College baseball: Fullerton, USC, Pepperdine and Long Beach begin tournament play Thursday.

Top-ranked Cal State Fullerton, No. 2 USC, No. 14 Pepperdine and No. 23 Long Beach State were among the 48 teams selected Monday by the NCAA to play in the Division I baseball tournament, which begins Thursday and Friday at eight regional sites.

Only seven schools from the West are in the tournament, the fewest since the 48-team format was adopted in 1987. Regional winners will advance to the College World Series June 2-10 at Omaha.

Big West Conference champion Fullerton is seeded No. 1 in the South Regional at Baton Rouge, La., and will open Thursday against Northeast Louisiana in a double-elimination tournament that includes LSU, Rice, Central Michigan and James Madison.

USC, champion of the Pacific 10 Conference, is seeded No. 1 in the West Regional at Fresno, which also includes Long Beach and Pepperdine.

USC, which has won 11 national titles but is seeking its first World Series appearance since 1978, will play Middle Tennessee State in a first-round game Thursday. Second-seeded Long Beach will play Southwest Missouri State, and fourth-seeded Pepperdine will play third-seeded Fresno State.

Stanford is seeded third in the Midwest I Regional at Wichita, Kan., and will play a first-round game against Arkansas on Friday. California is seeded third in the Mideast Regional at Knoxville, Tenn., and will open against Georgia Tech on Thursday.

Eighteen schools, including Fullerton and USC, qualified automatically by winning their conference tournaments. Thirty others were selected based on records and strength of schedule.

Six teams from the Southeastern Conference are in the tournament. The Atlantic Coast and Southwest conferences each have four teams, and the Pac-10, Missouri Valley, Colonial Athletic and Sun Belt each have three.

USC Coach Mike Gillespie said the absence of more teams from the West is disturbing. Arizona State, Nevada and Santa Clara were on the bubble.

“The SEC has six teams in the tournament and the entire West has seven?” Gillespie said. “Something is wrong.”

Long Beach Coach Dave Snow said: “If you’re only going to take seven [from the West], I think it would have been more fair to disperse them more. To put four of us in the same regional makes it a very tough regional.”

Ron Maestri, chairman of the NCAA Division I baseball committee, said that sending Long Beach to Fresno as a No. 2-seeded team necessitated sending Fullerton to Baton Rouge because teams from the same conference are not supposed to be in the same regional. Maestri said the committee kept USC in the West because the Trojans played at Baton Rouge in last year’s tournament.

The pairings:

Atlantic I at Tallahassee, Fla., Thursday-Sunday--No. 1-seeded Florida State vs. No. 6 Troy State; No. 2 Mississippi vs. No. 5 Old Dominion; No. 3 South Alabama vs. No. 4 Central Florida.

Atlantic II at Coral Gables, Fla., Friday-Monday--No. 1 Miami (Fla.) vs. No. 6 Massachusetts; No. 2 Texas A&M; vs. No. 5 Florida International; No. 3 North Carolina vs. No. 4 South Florida.

West at Fresno, Thursday-Sunday--No. 1 USC vs. No. 6 Middle Tennessee State; No. 2 Long Beach State vs. No. 5 Southwest Missouri State; No. 3 Fresno State vs. No. 4 Pepperdine.

East at Clemson, S.C., Thursday-Sunday--No. 1 Clemson vs. No. 6 Navy; No. 2 Alabama vs. No. 5 Winthrop; No. 3 Jacksonville vs. No. 4 Richmond.

Mideast at Knoxville, Tenn., Thursday-Sunday--No. 1 Tennessee vs. No. 6 The Citadel; No. 2 Oklahoma State vs. No. 5 Pittsburgh; No. 3 California vs. No. 4 Georgia Tech.

Midwest I at Wichita, Kan., Friday-Monday--No. 1 Texas Tech vs. No. 6 Providence; No. 2 Wichita State vs. No. 5 Lamar; No. 3 Stanford vs. Arkansas.

Midwest II at Oklahoma City, Thursday-Sunday--No. 1 Auburn vs. No. 6 Pennsylvania; No. 2 Oklahoma vs. No. 5 Indiana State; No. 3 Texas vs. No. 4 Ohio State.

South at Baton Rouge, La., Thursday-Sunday--No. 1 Cal State Fullerton vs. No. 6 Northeast Louisiana; No. 2 Louisiana State vs. No. 5 Central Michigan; No. 3 Rice vs. No. 4 James Madison.