Harding's NCAA Tournament Notes
NCAA II South Region Tournament Page
PENSACOLA, Fla. – The Harding University baseball team will play its first-ever game at the NCAA II South Region Tournament on Thursday at 1:15 p.m. at Jim Spooner Field on the campus of the University of West Florida. Its opponent, the University of Tampa, will be playing in its 12th straight South Region Tournament and 26th overall.
All of Harding's games at the South Region Tournament will be broadcast live on KVHU 95.3-FM in Searcy and audio of the broadcast will stream live on HardingSports.com.
Harding is the No. 3 seed in the tournament, while Tampa is No. 6. The winner of the game will take on the winner of No. 2 Southern Arkansas and No. 7 North Alabama on Friday at 4:30 p.m. The losers meet Friday at 10 a.m.
The South Region Tournament will likely be one of the toughest of the eight regional tournaments that decide which teams advance to the NCAA II World Series on May 28-June 3 in Cary, N.C. Of the top 16 teams in the latest Collegiate Baseball News Top 30 Poll, five of them are in the South Region Tournament. Tampa is ranked 13th in the poll, and Harding is ranked 16th.
Harding had its best season in program history in 2011. The Bisons set a school record with 41 victories, won the Gulf South Conference West Division regular season title and advanced to the championship game of the GSC Tournament.
Tampa enters the tournament 35-15 overall and finished 16-8 (third place) in the Sunshine State Conference. UT is currently riding a five-game winning streak and has also won eight of its last nine games dating back to April 23.
Tampa has won four of the last five NCAA South Region Tournaments and 14 overall. The squad has won five NCAA Division II national championships.
Harding and Tampa have never met on the baseball diamond prior to Thursday's game.
The Bisons enter the matchup with a 3.23 ERA, giving Harding the 23rd-best pitching staff in Division II. All three of Harding's top starting pitchers—senior Brodie Brumley and sophomores Logan Holthaus and Lucas Waddell—earned All-GSC honors.
Brumley, a native of Scottsboro, Ala., started the first game of the GSC Tournament for the Bisons and could get the ball for the opener against Tampa. He is 4-4 this season with a 4.24 ERA. Waddell, who is 9-2 with a 3.76 ERA, is also a possible starter in game one.
Tampa, who boasts the 18th-best scoring offense in Division II, has a .341 team batting average and averages 7.9 runs per game.
The Spartans will likely start senior Josh Thrailkill, a senior who transferred to Tampa this season after pitching three seasons at Clemson University. Thrailkill is 3-3 with a 4.52 ERA.
