From NAIA
KANSAS CITY, Mo. – The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) has officially announced the pairings and site selection for the 2010 NAIA Baseball National Championship Opening Round. There are nine National Championship Opening Round sites, with the tournaments running from May 18-21. Each tournament is referred to as a “Group”.
Complete groupings
Each site will feature a five-team double elimination tournament. The first game pits the No. 4 and the No. 5 seed, with the winner facing the No. 1 seed in the first day's third and final game. The second game of the day lists the No. 2 versus the No. 3 seed.
The list of official National Championship Opening Round host sites is: Cleveland, Tenn., Columbus, Ga., Daytona Beach, Fla., Fresno, Calif., Jackson, Miss., Joliet, Ill., Lubbock, Texas, Oklahoma City, Okla., and Riverside, Calif. Four of the sites also hosted a 2009 Opening Round tournament: Cleveland, Daytona Beach, Lubbock and Oklahoma City.
The no. 7 ranked UBC Thunderbirds are the no. 1 seed at Fresno, a group that features three teams in the top 20. Hosts, no. 11 Fresno Pacific, are the no. 2 seed while defending NAIA runner-ups, no. 17 Point Loma Nazarene, are third. Also making the trip to Fresno are the University of Houston at Victoria and Ohio Dominican as the no. 4 and no. 5 seeds respectively.
Perhaps the most difficult Opening Round tournament is Group #2 with California Baptist University as the host. According to the final Top 25 ranking released on Wednesday, California Baptist is ranked No. 3 followed by No. 10 Madonna (Mich.) and No. 15 College of Idaho. This Group is the only one with three top-15 ranked programs.
The winners of those nine National Championship Opening Round tournaments, in addition to World Series host Lewis-Clark State (Idaho), will meet at the final site of the 54th Annual Avista-NAIA World Series from May 28-June 4 in Lewiston, Idaho. The 10-team, official bracket for the Avista-NAIA World Series will be announced by 7 p.m. CDT on May 21.
This year's field is comprised of 32 automatic qualifiers from NAIA affiliated conferences, Association of Independent Institutions and unaffiliated groupings and 14 at-larges, which were determined using the final Top 25 rating released on Wednesday. Defending national champion Lubbock Christian (Texas), one of nine Opening Round hosts, is appearing in its ninth National Championship. The Chaps qualified as winners of the Sooner Athletic Conference regular season with an overall record of 43-13.
No. 1-ranked Lewis-Clark State holds the most wins in Championship history with a 117-13 record and are making their NAIA-record 29th overall trip. The Warriors have won seven of the last 11 World Series titles and a NAIA-high 16 overall trophies. Among the Championship field, eight programs have won at least one World Series title. Behind the national record of 16 rings earned by Lewis-Clark State, Lubbock Christian is the other member with multiple National Championships (1983, 2009).
Four teams are making at least their 10th trip to the National Championship led by the 29 appearances of Lewis-Clark State. Cumberland (Tenn.), Oklahoma City and William Jewell (Mo.) all are playing in their 12th event.
Twelve teams are making their first National Championship appearance: Avila (Mo.), Faulkner (Ala.), Huntington (Ind.), Indiana-Southeast, Missouri Baptist, Mount Marty (S.D.), Northwestern (Iowa), Rio Grande (Ohio), Robert Morris (Ill.), South Carolina-Beaufort, Texas at Brownsville and York (Neb.).
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