Middle Tennessee State University Athletics
MT Softball Headed to Tuscaloosa Regional
5/13/2018 9:47:00 PM | Softball
MURFREESBORO, Tenn. - For only the second time in program history the Middle Tennessee softball team is headed to the postseason. The Blue Raiders earned an automatic bid to the NCAA Regionals by winning the C-USA Tournament on Saturday.
MT is headed to Tuscaloosa, Alabama for the NCAA Regional. The four-team tournament is made up of Middle Tennessee, Oregon State, Wisconsin and No. 12 Alabama. The tournament gets underway on Friday, May 18.
Middle Tennessee will be one of 64 teams participating in regionals around the country on May 18-20. At each campus site, a four-team, double-elimination tournament will be conducted and the 16 winning teams advanced to the Super Regionals. The winning teams from each of the 16 regionals will advance to the NCAA Super Regionals on
The Super Regionals for the NCAA Division I Softball Championship will be held May 24-27, 2018 on eight campus sites. At each site, two teams play in a best-of-three tournament format. The winners from each site advance to the NCAA Women's College World Series.
The 2018 NCAA Women's College World Series will be held at USA Softball Hall of Fame Stadium - OGE Energy Field in Oklahoma City, May 31- June 5/6, 2018. The eight teams will compete in a double elimination bracket with the final two teams then competing in a best of three format.
Middle Tennessee's spot among the nation's top 64 teams came during the 12th round announced by the NCAA Softball selection show on ESPN2. The Blue Raiders will be the No. 4 seed in a field that includes three other Power Five Conference opponents.
It is the second NCAA berth in program history, with the last one coming in 2000 when the Raiders won the Ohio Valley Conference Automatic Bid. MT was selected to go to the Tucson, Ariz. Regional where they fell to No. 2 Arizona (0-8) and Illinois State (1-3).
"It was huge seeing our name shoot up on the board," said Head Coach Jeff Breeden. "It is going to make expectations from our staff and players get that much higher. Now that we've won the conference tournament, our expectations moving forward are always going to be to go as deep in the NCAA tournament as we can and maybe sometime in the future we'll be one of those top 16 seeds hosting a regional."
All-Tournament MVP, Cori Jennings, as well as All-Tournament team members, Kristin Uselton, Summer Burgess, Kirstyn Cuccia and Precious Birdsong, will lead the Blue Raiders' lineup. Jennings tossed a two-hitter and no hitter as the Blue Raiders went undefeated at the C-USA Tournament. Uselton and Cuccia were the RBI getters as they hit grand slams in back-to-back games against FAU.
A full bracket and list of teams can be found on the NCAA's website.
