The three-peat West Region champion UC San Diego baseball team arrived in North Carolina this week for the 2019 NCAA Division II Championship, starting Saturday.
Play at the eight-team, double-elimination tournament, at the USA Baseball National Training Complex in Cary, N.C., continues through June 8.
The Tritons (40-14), seeded No. 6, will be the visitor in their tournament opener at noon PT Sunday against No. 3 seed Catawba College. NCAA.com live streams the games.
The Indians, from Salisbury, N.C., will enjoy what is essentially a home game, as Catawba is about 120 miles west of Cary. The Southeast Region champions are winners of 13 straight games.
“It was a good season, but we’re not done yet,” said Brandon Weed, the Division II West Region Pitcher of the Year. He added that he was “super excited” to be at the championships.
Second-seeded Tampa (41-14) and seventh-seeded Mercyhurst (34-14) are the other two teams on UC San Diego’s side of the bracket.
Sunday’s winners will face off at 4 p.m. PT Tuesday, while the losers will face an elimination game, also at noon PT Tuesday.
The other bracket, which begins play Saturday, features top seed Colorado Mesa, fourth-seeded Ashland, fifth-seeded Central Missouri and No. 8 seed NYIT.
If two teams emerge undefeated after Thursday’s games, they will begin a best-of-three championship series at noon PT Friday.
This is the first time in UCSD history that the Tritons have won three straight West Region titles. UC San Diego is making a third straight trip for the first time since Tampa did so from 2013-15. They are the first West Region team to do it in over a decade, since rival Chico State from 2004-06.
UC San Diego has won 33 of its last 43 games. This season the team has had three notable winning streaks – 10 games and seven games (twice). They prevailed in two must-win games against Point Loma Nazarene University last month to earn their berth in Cary.
– Staff reports
