Baseball Whitewater bound for NCAA regional

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The St. Thomas baseball team will begin its 2013 NCAA tournament as the top-seed in the Midwest Regional tournament May 15-19 in Whitewater, Wis.

The 56-team field was announced Monday morning. St. Thomas will play St. Scholastica in the opening round Wednesday at noon. It’s the ninth straight NCAA appearance for the Saints who are coming off their 16th-straight UMAC tournament title. The two teams met in last year’s regional semifinal, a 22-2 St. Thomas victory that spring-boarded the team to a third place overall finish at the national tournament.

<p>The St. Thomas baseball team proudly lifts its MIAC championship plaque into the air after defeating the Concordia Cobbers 11-2 Sunday. The Tommies will advance to the first round of the NCAA tournament after its first MIAC championship win since 2010. (Rosie Murphy/TommieMedia) </p>
The St. Thomas baseball team proudly lifts its MIAC championship plaque into the air after defeating the Concordia Cobbers 11-2 Sunday. The Tommies will advance to the first round of the NCAA tournament after its first MIAC championship win since 2010. (Rosie Murphy/TommieMedia)

St. Scholastica (27-9) received the UMAC’s automatic bid as its conference champion. The Saints have won seven straight since being swept by Wis.-Whitewater May 1.

The region features three teams from the D3baseball.com’s top 25 poll including: No. 3 Wis.-Whitewater, No. 9 Wis.-Stevens Point, Case Western Reserve (Ohio) and Benedictine (Ill.).

The NCAA DIII regionals are composed of four, eight-team regionals and four, six-team regionals. All regionals are double-elimination, with the winner of the eight regional tournaments advancing to the national tournament on May 24-28 in Appleton, Wis.

The Tommies come into the regional white-hot, winners of 25 of their last 26 games. Since April 25, St. Thomas has outscored its opponents 171-35.

St. Thomas split the season series with the Saints, posting a 6-3 victory and a 3-2 loss on May 4 at the Metrodome. Weather cancelled a third meeting in April.

The Tommies also split a season series with Wis.-Stevens Point, dropping a 3-2 contest and winning a 9-7 game March 23 in Florida. St. Thomas also split a twinbill with Wis.-Whitewater at the Metrodome.

The MIAC regular season title went to the Tommies for the 11th straight year and the team won its first conference tournament title since 2010. St. Thomas set a MIAC record for winning margin in the final conference standings, in any sport, winning the conference regular season title by eight games.

St. Thomas tied a conference record and became just the fourth team in conference history to finish 19-1 in conference since 1984.

Check TommieMedia later today for more coverage.