Skip to content

Ad Disclosure

Nebraska gets tough draw, 3 B1G baseball teams qualify for NCAA Tournament

Spenser Davis

By Spenser Davis

Published:

Nebraska, Maryland and Michigan have received invitations to the 2021 NCAA Baseball Tournament.

The Cornhuskers, who won the Big Ten with a 31-12 record, received a particularly tough draw. They will head to Fayetteville to face Arkansas in their NCAA regional next week. The Razorbacks are the No. 1 overall seed and the clear top team in the country.

Northeastern and New Jersey Institute of Technology are the other teams in this regional.

The Terps, who finished second in the Big Ten, are the No. 3 seed in the Greenville regional. East Carolina is the hosting team. Norfolk State and Charlotte will also be there.

Michigan finished third in the Big Ten with a 27-17 record. The Wolverines will be a No. 3 seed in the South Bend Regional. They’ll be joined by Notre Dame, UConn and Central Michigan.

The Big Ten was the only major conference to play a conference-only schedule, which had an impact on the league’s NCAA Tournament résumés. The league struggled to impress via RPI, with only Nebraska (42) and Maryland (60) ranking in the top 75.

Iowa was third in the Big Ten in RPI (76) and finished tied for fourth in the Big Ten with Indiana. The Hoosiers were ranked No. 106 in RPI. Neither team qualified for the NCAA Tournament.

However, the Wolverines did make the tournament despite having an RPI of 89 — albeit as one of the last four teams in the field. In Michigan’s case, it seems the committee decided to look past their RPI ranking due to the lack of nonconference games:

NCAA regionals begin on Friday, June 4.

Spenser Davis

Spenser is the news manager at Saturday Road and covers college football across all Saturday Football brands.