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Baseball Weekly Notes Package

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Oklahoma State, TCU, Texas and Texas Tech enter the 2015 season ranked in the top 25 of all six national polls. TCU ranks as high as No. 2 and is in the top 10 on all lists along with Texas.

All four teams closed out last year ranked in the top 10. It was the first time in league history four Big 12 teams finished the regular season ranked in the top 10 of all four national polls. Six of the league’s nine squads appeared in the national rankings over the course of 2014.

Five of the league’s nine teams have opening weekend series against ranked teams (highest opponent ranking in parentheses) - Baylor vs. Cal Poly (No. 13), Kansas at LSU (No. 2), Oklahoma State at Arizona State (No. 18), Texas at Rice (No. 13), and West Virginia at Clemson (No. 24).

The Big 12 finished with the second-best conference RPI in the nation in 2014. Six teams (67 percent) finished in the top 50 with four league teams in the top 20 for just the third time in conference history.

The Big 12 advanced 80 percent of its 2014 NCAA postseason teams to the Super Regional field and was represented in the CWS with one-third of its baseball-playing institutions. Sixty percent of its NCAA tournament teams advanced to Omaha (3-of-5).

All four Super Regional teams served as hosts with the Big 12 comprising one-fourth of the field of 16. Since the Super Regional format began in 1999, it marked just the second time that one conference has had four teams serve as hosts in the same year (ACC, 2013).

TCU was selected as the unanimous choice to win the 2015 regular season in the coaches preseason poll. A different league team has won the regular season crown in each of the past four years (2011-14).

TCU’s 2.22 ERA in 2014 led the nation while Texas’ mark of 2.25 ranked fourth. The Big 12 was the only conference with multiple teams in the nation’s top 10. The Horned Frogs ranked third nationally in shutouts while Texas ranked fifth. TCU and UT were two of three schools to finish in the top five in both ERA and shutouts.

Of the Big 12’s four Super Regional teams from 2014, OSU and TTU return over 20 letterwinners each, while TCU will welcome back eight returning pitchers and UT seven returning position players.