The path to Omaha is a fraught one, filled with twists and turns. One missed tag, bad pitch or costly groundball and your team could be watching the rest of the tournament from home.
We’re down to the final eight teams and almost all of them have survived elimination games or mounted comebacks to avoid slipping into the losers’ bracket. To get you caught up on all that happened, here’s a look at those twists and turns on a game-by-game level by utilizing win probability to measure the ebbs and flows of a baseball game.
An important caveat before we dig into these numbers: Ideally, the win probabilities in this would be based on college baseball. Because of a general lack of play-by-play data even just a few years back, generating a table of wins for every situation simply isn’t feasible. Instead, we’ll be relying on Major League Baseball values. Of course, it’s not a direct comparison and there are far more blowouts and lopsided victories (as well as inflated run totals) in college baseball, but it still does a great job of painting a picture of a game.
Anyway, on to the charts!
Texas
The Longhorns weren’t truly challenged until super regionals, having made quick work of Air Force and Louisiana Tech. The second game—against the Bulldogs—was knotted up at one apiece through six-and-a-half innings. Texas quickly took control, though, with a three-run seventh inning that featured a trio of RBIs from Ivan Melendez, Murphy Stehly and Skyler Messinger.
A three-game set with East Carolina followed and the Pirates came out swinging. East Carolina led 7-2 heading into the sixth, only to let Texas back into the game. The Pirates removed all doubt with a five-run eight inning, though.
The second game—with Texas facing elimination—was a roller coaster ride. As you can tell by the win probability chart, the Longhorns took an early lead before the Pirates answered with a five-run fifth. That lead didn’t last long, with Douglas Hodo III (solo) and Messinger (3-run) launching homers to take an 8-7 lead in the eighth. East Carolina promptly tied it in the top of the ninth on Jacob Starling’s solo home run, but the Longhorns walked it off courtesy of Dylan Campbell.
That comeback from Texas proved to be the final punch in the series. The final game was a lopsided affair, marred by a lengthy rain delay. The Longhorns took a 4-0 lead in the first before the rain came, then only added to it in what was a comfortable 11-1 victory.
Notre Dame
The second time…
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