LSU baseball's road at the College World Series is set, and it'll kick off with a familiar opponent.
The Tigers will draw Tennessee in their half of the 8-team bracket's opening game, which will be played at 6 p.m. on Saturday. The game will be broadcast on ESPN from Charles Schwab Field in Omaha, Nebraska.
It was going to be a matchup with revenge potential either way, with the Volunteers facing taking down Southern Miss 5-0 in a winner-take-all Game 3 in Hattiesburg. The Golden Eagles were the team that bounced LSU from the regional a year ago, while Tennessee swept the Tigers out of the supers in the 2021 season, which doubled as the last under head coach Paul Mainieri.
LSU won 5-2, 6-4, but closed out the series with a 14-7 loss when the teams met in late march.
The action will kick off earlier in the day with top overall seed Wake Forest facing off with Stanford at 1 p.m.
From there it will be the same double-elimination format as regional play, with the two losing teams facing off in the loser's bracket at 1 p.m. on Monday (ESPN). The 1-0 teams will face off at 6 p.m. on ESPN2.
The two 1-1 teams will then face off, with the winner taking on the 2-0 team. Those games times and networks are yet to be announced.
The opposite side of the bracket will take the field on Friday, with TCU against Oral Roberts at 1 p.m, and Florida against Virginia at 6 p.m. both games will be on ESPN. The next two games of that region will face off on Sunday.
Should LSU advance to the championship series, the opener will take place at 6 p.m. on Saturday, June 24. The second game would be at 2 p.m. on Sunday, with the if-necessary third game scheduled for 6 p.m. the following Monday. All three games will be aired on ESPN.
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The Tigers are making their 19th College World Series appearance, but the first since 2017. LSU is also making its first trip to Omaha in the Jay Johnson era after making five trips under head coach Paul Mainieri. The Tigers have thus far rolled through the NCAA Tournament, beating Tulane in their opener before notching two wins against Oregon State to win the Baton Rouge regional, and following that up with back-to-back wins over Kentucky in the supers.
Wake Forest was equally as dominant as it took down Alabama, while Stanford and Tennessee had to win a Game 3 on Monday. Stanford's win came in wild fashion as it advanced on a walk-off popup to shallow right field with the Texas outfielders losing the ball in the lights.
The biggest question remaining for LSU is how the pitching staff is deployed with a potential showdown against Wake Forest looming in Game 2, barring upsets. Johnson opted to keep things scheduled in the regional by throwing superstar Paul Skenes against Tulane. He could opt to save Skenes for a Monday start and throw Thatcher Hurd or Ty Floyd in the opener. The junior transfer has been utterly dominant in his lone season in Baton Rouge, throwing 16.1 innings, allowing 11 hits and 2 runs while striking out 21 batters. Skenes currently sits with 188 strikeouts on the season, already good for No. 2 all time in LSU history for a single season and just 14 behind Ben McDonald for the all-time mark, which doubles as the SEC record set at 202 in 1989. Skenes needs just 7 strikeouts to surpass David Price for No. 2 all time in SEC history.
Skenes and superstar LSU centerfielder Dylan Crews are widely expected to be the No. 1 and 2 picks in the upcoming MLB draft.
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