UCLA, UC Irvine and UC Santa Barbara open NCAA baseball tournament play Friday
The UCLA baseball team is headed to the Lubbock (Texas) Regional and UC Irvine to the Stanford Regional in the 64-team field announced for the NCAA tournament. UC Santa Barbara will play in Tucson, Ariz.
The Bruins (35-18) open against North Carolina at 4 p.m. PDT. Host school Texas Tech and Army fill out the four-team double-elimination regional.
The Anteaters (40-16), making their first postseason appearance in seven years, play Nevada at 6 p.m. PDT in Palo Alto. North Dakota State rounds out the regional hosted by the Cardinal.
The Gauchos (39-18) open play at 1 p.m. PDT against Oklahoma State in Tucson, where host Arizona and Grand Canyon are also playing.
SEC champion Arkansas was seeded No. 1 overall, followed by Texas, Tennessee, Vanderbilt, Arizona, Texas Christian, Mississippi State and Texas Tech. The eight top seeds would host best-of-three super regionals the following week if they advance.
Super regional winners advance to the College World Series in Omaha, Neb., on June 19-30. The stadium will be at full capacity for the games.
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