Chapel Hill or College Station? Publications predict where Texas heads for NCAA regionals

At 11 a.m. on Monday, the field for the 2024 NCAA baseball tournament will be revealed during an ESPN2-televised selection show.

Texas is expected to be one of the 64 teams that makes the cut for this year's NCAA tournament. This spring, UT has compiled a 35-22 record. Texas finished in third place in the Big 12 standings, but the team lost both of its games at its conference tournament.

So where is Texas going when regional play gets underway this week? Leading publications like D1Baseball and Baseball America recently published their best guesses for the Longhorns' fate.

D1Baseball: Texas has been locked into the No. 2 seed in the College Station regional by D1Baseball for a while and nothing changed in the website's final projections. The Aggies and Longhorns, who played in early March, would be joined by No. 3 Nicholls and No. 4 Grambling if this prediction is correct. D1Baseball penciled Texas A&M in as the No. 4 overall seed .

Baseball America: Over the past week, Baseball America tied Texas to hypothetical regionals hosted by Virginia, Clemson and North Carolina. It settled on sending UT to Chapel Hill, which is home to the No. 3 national seed in this prediction. Second-seeded Texas was projected to compete against the host Tar Heels, No. 3 Wofford and No. 4 Long Island.

On3: In this crystal ball, Texas is seen heading to Kentucky where No. 3 St. John's and No. 4 Northern Kentucky also await. If Texas is indeed sent to Lexington, the Longhorns will know one of the hosts. Kentucky third baseman Mitchell Daly played at Texas from 2021-23.

247Sports: Like D1Baseball, 247Sports also couldn't resist a regional that featured both Texas and Texas A&M. But in these projections, the No. 3 and No. 4 seeds in College Station are St. John's and Niagara. Texas and Texas A&M have actually met in two of the last five NCAA tournaments. The Aggies were beaten by Texas at the Austin regional in 2018, but Texas A&M eliminated Texas from the 2022 College World Series.

Since David Pierce took over the baseball program ahead of the 2017 season, Texas has gone on the road for two regionals. The Longhorns reached the final game of the Long Beach State regional in 2017, and Texas was the last team standing in Miami last year.

With the prospects of hosting a regional having faded, Pierce was asked after Texas was eliminated at the Big 12 tournament about playing on the road in the NCAA tournament. Texas is 11-5 in road games but 0-5 in neutral-site contests this season.

"The road has not bothered us. It kind of helps us. I don’t have any negative concerns at all," Piece responded. "We know when we go on the road, we will prepare for it. It doesn’t matter if it’s turf or grass. It doesn't matter if it’s east coast or west coast. it just really does not matter. We just want to have an opportunity to compete, advance and continue to grow and become a better team.”

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Predictions published about Texas' fate in NCAA baseball tournament