Coastal Carolina baseball learns NCAA Tournament path. Here’s the schedule
Coastal Carolina baseball’s path to get back to Omaha is set.
The Chanticleers (37-21) will be a No. 2 seed in the Tallahassee regional and face 3-seed Northern Illinois (35-17) at 8 p.m. Friday (ESPN+). Top-seeded Florida State (38-17) will face 4-seed St. John’s (33-24) at 3 p.m. Friday (ACC Network).
The NCAA announced its 2026 college baseball tournament bracket on Monday. The regional games are played with a double-elimination format.
The winner of the Tallahassee Regional winner will face the Tuscaloosa Regional winner in a best-of-three super regional series next week.
This is Coastal’s 22nd appearance in the NCAA Tournament while Northern Illinois is making its first NCAA appearance since the 1970s. The Chanticleers are coming off their second trip to the College World Series in 2025. Coastal lost to LSU in the CWS championship last year.
The Chanticleers were a Top 10 team earlier this season and were on track to host a regional. They struggled down the stretch, though, losing six of the final nine games to end the regular season. Coastal went 1-2 at the Sun Belt Conference tournament last week.
Coastal has dealt with a variety of injuries in the season, including top pitchers Cam Flukey, Hayden Johnson and Dom Carbone. Flukey returned last month to the rotation, while Carbone and Johnson had season-ending surgeries.
“We have dealt with everything possible that you could deal with in a season. It has been grueling at times,” Coastal coach Kevin Schnall told reporters Monday. “But I can sit here and say that it has been extremely rewarding to see what this team has gone through. With the amount of injuries we dealt with and to have the amount of success we were able to accomplish through that adversity, this team will go down in my history book as one of the most resilient and toughest teams that we have ever had.
“The season is not over. But let’s call it what is: We’ve got to play a lot better if we want to advance.”
Coastal’s NCAA appearance comes as coach Schnall is being mentioned as a possible candidate for the South Carolina Gamecocks job. Schnall wasn’t asked about that on Monday but he did address the situation earlier in the season.
“The only thing I can speak on with certainty is that our focus right now is extremely microscopic, and there are only two things that matter,” Schnall said. “Number one, what can we do to make this team better? Number two, what can we do to make this program better?”
Citadel, USC Upstate in NCAAs
Coastal is one of three schools from South Carolina in the 64-team field.
The Citadel (35-24) had a surprising run to win the Southern Conference Tournament for its first NCAAs appearance since 2010. The Bulldogs are in the Atlanta Regional and will play Oklahoma at 5 p.m. Friday in the first round. Georgia Tech (48-9), the tournament’s No. 2 overall seed, and University of Illinois Chicago are the other two teams in the regional and will play at noon.
Former Newberry College coach and Brookland-Cayce graduate Russell Triplett is in his second season as The Citadel’s coach.
USC Upstate (33-28) earned its second-straight NCAA appearance after winning the Big South Conference Tournament. The Spartans are the No. 3 seed in the Tuscaloosa Regional and will face No. 2 Oklahoma State (37-20) in the opener Friday at 2 p.m. Alabama (37-19), the No. 7 overall seed in the tournament and Alabama State (34-21) are the other two teams in the regional and will play at 7 p.m. Friday.
This story was originally published May 25, 2026 at 12:25 PM with the headline "Coastal Carolina baseball learns NCAA Tournament path. Here’s the schedule."
