For the fifth consecutive season, a national champion will officially come from the SEC.
Yes, after the conference sent four different teams to Omaha for the 2024 Men’s College World Series, the final two teams remaining in college baseball are both from the SEC in the Tennessee Volunteers and Texas A&M Aggies. Both teams have been dominant so far in Omaha, and now find themselves matched up against one another in a best-of-three series to crown a national champion.
However, which of those two SEC teams will in fact be crowned as the 2024 national champion, winning the first in each’s respective program history in the process? Well, that will officially be decided over the next two-to-three days, with Game 1 of the 2024 CWS Finals set to take place Saturday night, as well as Game 2 following Sunday afternoon.
If needed, a decisive, winner-take-all, Game 3 would then be played Monday night.
So, ahead of this weekend’s national championship series between Tennessee and Texas A&M, let’s take a look at both teams, as well as make a prediction as to who wins.
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- Overall Record: 58-12 overall (22-8 in SEC)
- Accolades/Seed: SEC Tournament Champions, SEC Regular Season Co-Champions, No. 1 overall seed in NCAA Tournament
- Team AVG/ERA: .311 AVG, 3.87 ERA
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- Overall Record: 52-13 overall (19-11 in SEC)
- Accolades/Seed: No. 3 overall seed
- Team AVG/ERA: .298 AVG, 3.80 ERA
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- Regional: 3-0 overall (defeated Northern Kentucky, Indiana, Southern Miss)
- Super Regional: 2-1 overall vs. Evansville
- College World Series: 3-0 overall (defeated Florida State twice, North Carolina)
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Regional: 3-0 overall (defeated Grambling, Texas, Louisiana)
Super Regional: 2-0 overall vs. Oregon
College World Series: 3-0 overall (defeated Florida twice, Kentucky)
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- 2B Christian Moore: .385/.460/.816 slash line (1.276 OPS), 33 HR, 73 RBI, 4 SB, 19 2B
- 1B Blake Burke: .382/.453/.713 slash line (1.166 OPS), 20 HR, 61 RBI, 11 SB, 28 2B
- OF Dylan Dreiling: .329/.453/.679 slash line (1.132 OPS), 20 HR, 68 RBI, 4 SB, 18 2B
- 3B Billy Amick: .313/.392/.663 slash line (1.055 OPS), 23 HR, 65 RBI, 3 SB, 14 SB
- LHP Zander Sechrist: 5-1 record, 3.22 ERA, 69-15 K-BB ratio, .251 AVG against
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- OF Jace LaViolette: .306/.450/.734 slash line (1.184 OPS), 28 HR, 77 RBI, 7 SB, 16 2B
- LHP Ryan Prager: 9-1 record, 2.88 ERA, 118-20 K-BB ratio, .216 AVG against
- 3B Gavin Grahovac: .303/.398/.601 slash line (.999 OPS), 22 HR, 64 RBI, 4 SB, 15 2B
- LHP Evan Aschenbeck: 6-1 record, 1.54 ERA, 77-12 K-BB ratio, .185 AVG against
- RHP Chris Cortez: 10-3 record, 2.98 ERA, 95-32 K-BB ratio, .192 AVG against
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Prediction: Texas A&M wins in three games
Tennessee and Texas A&M have met only once previously so far this season, a game in which the Volunteers won 7-4 at the SEC Tournament. I’ll say that this series goes three games, with Texas A&M’s pitching such as Cortez, Prager, and Aschenbeck proving to be impactful on the Aggies way to winning their first national championship in program history.
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Courtesy : https://collegesportswire.usatoday.com/lists/college-world-series-championship-preview-tennessee-vols-texas-aggies/