2024 College World Series Finals Set With Tennessee vs. Texas A&M

June 14: The Tennessee Volunteers celebrate after a walk-off single by Dylan Dreiling (8) against Florida State. Tennessee won the game, 12-11. Dylan Widger, USA TODAY Sports

The sports world will focus on Omaha, Neb. this weekend for the 2024 College World Series Finals at Charles Schwab Field Omaha. The best-of-three series starts Saturday with the No. 1 seed Tennessee Volunteers taking on the third-seeded Texas A&M Aggies in an All-Southeastern Conference affair. Game 2 is on Sunday, with Game 3, if needed, occurring on Monday night.

Tennessee enters as the favorite, coming off a season that has looked like three separate seasons in one. The Vols began the year in dominant fashion, winning 18 of their first 19 games, with half of those victories coming by double-digits. Then, they experienced some turbulence and went 6-5 when the SEC schedule began, but regrouped in early April. Since that 11-game span, Tennessee is 23-6, which includes postseason play. The Volunteers won the SEC regular season, won the SEC Tournament, swept through a Regional they hosted and then won two of three in the Super Regional, which they also played host to.

Since reaching Omaha, Tennessee has flexed its muscle both at the plate and on the mound. The former came when it won a 12-11 shootout over Florida State in its opener, before allowing a combined three runs over its next two games versus North Carolina and, again, Florida State. That’s propelled the Vols into their second-ever College World Series Finals appearance as they lost their previous in 1951 to the Oklahoma Sooners.

As for the Aggies, they entered the season like gangbusters as they began the year ranked No. 8 in the AP Poll and started 39-6 to ascend to the No. 1 ranking in the nation. They came back to earth once May hit. A&M went 5-5 to close out the regular season, then lost back-to-back games in the SEC Tournament to get bounced out rather quickly. However, those would be their last defeats entering the 2024 College World Series as the Aggies have run through the competition in the NCAA Tournament.

Texas A&M earned a No. 3 seed for the tourney, and proceeded to sweep both its Regional and Super Regional, which were played in College Station, Texas. Upon reaching Omaha, the Aggies were matched up against fellow SEC programs in Florida and Kentucky, winning all three games against the schools, including two against the Gators. That has the Aggies in their first-ever College World Series Finals for a program that began play in 1876, with the CWS coming into existence in 1947.

These two programs met just once this year, and that was in the SEC Tournament in Hoover, Ala. Both teams had suffered defeats in their tourney openers, pitting them against each other in the loser’s bracket. In a win-or-go-home game, Tennessee prevailed 7-4 in a contest that saw every Vols starter reach base safely, while the Aggies committed three errors. Last season, the programs met four times – a three-game regular-season sweep by Tennessee, before an SEC Tournament win by Texas A&M.

This year, the teams are virtually even on the mound, as A&M ranks fourth nationally with a 3.86 ERA while Tennessee is just behind it, ranking sixth, with a 3.90 team ERA. On offense, the main difference between the two is how they get runs on the board. The Vols are mashers as their 177 home runs lead all of Division I and have 45 more homers than the Aggies. However, Texas A&M can use a small ball to round the bases as its 80 stolen bases are nearly double the 49 stolen bases that Tennessee gathered.

Tennessee is looking to defy history as No. 1 overall seeds haven’t had the best run of success at the CWS. In fact, since the NCAA began seeding the tournament in 1999, only one top overall seed has ever won the College World Series, and that was the inaugural No. 1 seed in the Miami Hurricanes in 1999. In the 24 College World Series since seeding began, half of the winners have been seeded teams and half have been unranked. While only a single No. 1 seed has won the tournament, three No. 3 seeds – which is what A&M is – have won the championship.

The winner will claim their first CWS title in program history, and become the 32nd different school to win the championship. A SEC champion is guaranteed, and the conference has dominated the tournament in recent years. The 2024 CWS champion will be the fifth straight to hail from the Southeastern Conference, and last year’s Finals also saw an All-SEC showdown as LSU defeated Florida in three games. The College World Series 2024 winner will be the 16th championship for the SEC, leaving it two behind the 18 won by the Pac-12 for the most by any conference.

Game 1 is on Saturday at 7:30 p.m. ET (ESPN), with Game 2 on Sunday at 2 p.m. ET (ABC), and Game 3 (if necessary) on Monday at 7 p.m. ET (ESPN).