INDIANAPOLIS — The second-ranked University of North Georgia baseball team has been selected to the 2017 NCAA Division II Baseball Tournament as announced Sunday evening on a live selection show on NCAA.com. The Nighthawks will be the second-seed in the Southeast Regional hosted by top-seeded Mount Olive at UMO's Scarborough Field. The seven-team regional begins play with the opening round on Thursday, May 18.
North Georgia (42-10) will meet seventh-seed Lincoln Memorial in the opening round on Thursday at 3:00 p.m. The Railsplitters earned the South Atlantic Conference automatic qualification after winning the conference tournament two weeks ago.
Also competing in the Southeast Regional are top-seeded and host Mount Olive, regular season and tournament champions of the Conference Carolinas, third-seeded USC Aiken, fourth-seeded Catawba, fifth-seeded UNC Pembroke and sixth-seeded Georgia College.
Head coach Tom Cantrell's squad is making its third trip to the NCAA Tournament with the other two appearances coming in 2008 and 2015.
This year's selection marks the second at-large selection for the program.
The seven-team, double-elimination regional is made up of three automatic qualifiers from the Peach Belt Conference, Conference Carolinas and South Atlantic Conference, as well as four at-large berths. Three of the four at-large selections hail from the Peach Belt.
2017 NCAA Division II Baseball Southeast Regional
Hosted by: University of Mount Olive - Mount Olive, N.C.
No. 1 Seed - Mount Olive (47-8), Conference Carolinas, Automatic Qualifier
No. 2 Seed - North Georgia (42-10), Peach Belt Conference, At-Large
No. 3 Seed - USC Aiken (39-13), Peach Belt Conference, At-Large
No. 4 Seed - Catawba (37-15), South Atlantic Conference, At-Large
No. 5 Seed - UNC Pembroke (40-15), Peach Belt Conference, At-Large
No. 6 Seed - Georgia College (35-17), Peach Belt Conference, Automatic Qualifier
No. 7 Seed - Lincoln Memorial (33-17), South Atlantic Conference, Automatic Qualifier
