Omaha – Tulane is ready to take on the big boys at the College World Series.
Three teams from the Big 12, two from the Southeastern Conference and two from the Pacific 10 have made it to Omaha, but it’s the top-seeded Green Wave team from Conference USA that is favored to win the school’s first NCAA championship.
Though the traditional power conferences remain dominant in college baseball, the CWS has a bit of a new look this year. Oregon State’s only other appearance was in 1952. Baylor is in the field for the third time, but first since 1978.
“It’s good to see the field starting to even out and that it’s not just the same schools dominating every year,” said senior center fielder Jeff Corsaletti of Florida, which is in the CWS for the first time since 1998.
Not everything has changed.
Established powerhouses Texas and Arizona State return, and each is looking for its sixth national title. The Longhorns are in the CWS for the fourth consecutive year and a record 32nd time overall.
The Sun Devils hadn’t been to Omaha since 1998. And the Nebraska Cornhuskers are back at Rosenblatt Stadium with a familiar sea of red-clad fans.
Bracket 1 opens today with No. 7 national seed Florida (45-20) meeting Tennessee (46-19) at noon MDT and No. 3 Nebraska (56-13) playing Arizona State (39-23) at 5 p.m.
First-round games Saturday in Bracket 2 match No. 1 Tulane (55-10) against Oregon State (46-10) at noon and Baylor (44-22) against Texas (51-16) at 5.
The bracket winners meet in a best-of-three championship series starting June 25.
Tulane will try to become the first No. 1 seed to win the championship since Miami in 1999.
The Green Wave started the season ranked first in one of the major polls and has been a consensus No. 1 the last three weeks.
Tulane, 17-5 against ranked opponents, proved its mettle with regular-season games against Arizona State, Cal State Fullerton, Pepperdine and LSU.
“It’s a relief for us to be here, going into preseason ranked as we were,” Tulane coach Rick Jones said. “We handled it as well as we could, and that comes with not only a veteran club but a talented club. I kept waiting for us to have that situation where we may have given in to (the pressure), but it never happened.”
The CWS opener matches SEC rivals Florida and Tennessee. The Gators are led by sophomore first baseman Matt LaPorta, who has 24 home runs and is among four Florida players who have 10 or more homers.
Tennessee coach Rod Delmonico will start freshman left- hander James Adkins instead of season-long No. 1 pitcher Luke Hochevar, a junior from Fowler. Adkins is 3-0 with 39 strikeouts in his past three games.
Nebraska enters the CWS with one of the deepest pitching staffs in the nation and the No. 2 pick in the recent major-league draft in third baseman Alex Gordon (Kansas City Royals).
