Texas baseball to face ECU in first ever Greenville Super Regional

After knocking out the four-seed Air Force Falcons to cap the Austin Regional on the night of June 5, head coach David Pierce and No. 9 Texas baseball are set to advance to super regionals for the second straight season. The difference between this season and last, though, is the fact that Texas won’t be hosting the super regional in Austin.

This time around, Pierce and the Longhorns will be taking on the upstart No. 8 East Carolina Pirates out of the American Athletic Conference in the first-ever Greenville Super Regional. The Longhorns will face the Pirates after ECU took down the Coastal Carolina Chanticleers in the final game of the Greenville Regional on June 6 by the commanding final score of 13-4.

ECU had to beat some pretty solid teams to get through the Greenville Regional, including a top 15-caliber team in the Virginia Cavaliers and Coastal Carolina.

David Pierce and No. 9 Texas baseball set to battle Bryson Worrell and No. 8 ECU in the first-ever Greenville Super Regional

https://twitter.com/ECUBaseball/status/1533946021025239040

ECU will carry an identical record as the Longhorns into the Greenville Super Regional, with each team sitting at 45-19.

The difference, though, is how much of a roll the Pirates are on right now. ECU has won a whopping 21 of their last 22 games heading into the Greenville Super Regional.

In fact, when the Chanticleers knocked off the Pirates in the Greenville Regional on June 5, it was the first time that ECU lost a game since April 26 on the road against the NC State Wolfpack. ECU is definitely one of the hottest teams in the entire country as this will not be an easy super regional to get through for the Longhorns.

The good news is that the Longhorns have plenty of momentum themselves heading into supers. Ivan Melendez and the Texas bats were rolling throughout the Austin Regional, putting up an impressive 26 runs in three games.

Melendez was able to notch his 30th home run of the season in the 10-1 win over Air Force on June 5 in the clinching game for the Longhorns in the Austin Regional. Melendez should be able to spark the Texas bats against Bryson Worrell and a red-hot ECU team this coming weekend in what is sure to be a rowdy atmosphere in the Greenville Super Regional.

But this will not be an easy task as Worrell and the Pirate bats have not slowed down in the last couple of months. In their regional-clinching win over Coastal Carolina over the weekend, Worrell put up four hits and four runs batted in.

Worrell is also considered one of the top MLB prospects in all of college baseball this year.

Super regionals will begin for Texas and ECU at Lewis Field in Greenville, NC, on June 10. The winner will get to move on to the College World Series. If Texas were to advance to Omaha, it would be the second straight appearance for them in the College World Series. Meanwhile, ECU currently holds the NCAA record for the most tournament appearances without a College World Series berth.