MANHATTAN, Kan. – For the first time since 2013, K-State baseball received an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament, as the Wildcats were selected to compete in the NCAA Fayetteville Regional hosted by No. 5 national seed Arkansas. This is the program's fifth NCAA Tournament appearance in school history and the first under head coach Pete Hughes.
K-State (32-24) was selected as the No. 3 seed in the Fayetteville Regional and will take on the second-seeded Louisiana Tech Bulldogs (45-17) on Friday, May 31, at 7 p.m. at Baum-Walker Stadium., in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament.
K-State and Louisiana Tech will meet for the fifth time in program history, with the Cats holding a 3-1 edge since the series start in 1986. The two squads last faced off on March 6, 2004, which led to K-State's 7-4 victory and extended its win streak to three over La Tech. The last time the Wildcats faced a member of Conference USA came in 2021 with a two-game series split at Rice.
The winner of the Kansas State-Louisiana Tech game will play the winner of top-seeded Arkansas (43-14) and fourth-seeded SEMO (34-25) on Saturday, June 1.
The winner of the Fayetteville Regional will play the winner of the Charlottesville Regional in the best-of-three-game super regional from June 7-9 or June 8-10. No. 12 national seed and top-seeded Virginia (41-15) hosts second-seeded Mississippi State (38-21), third-seeded St. John's (37-16-1) and fourth-seeded Pennsylvania (24-23) in Charlottesville, Va.
K-State's postseason roster features nine 2024 All-Big 12 selections. Brady Day was voted to the All-Big 12 First Team while Kaelen Culpepper and Tyson Neighbors received Second Team honors. Additionally, Owen Boerema, Nick English, Brendan Jones, Raphael Pelletier, and Jackson Wentworth each received honorable mention accolades while Blake Dean was named to the All-Freshman Team.
NCAA Fayetteville Regional
Friday, May 31
Game 1 – #1 Arkansas vs. #4 SEMO – 2 p.m. (ESPN+)
Game 2 – #2 Louisiana Tech vs. #3 Kansas State – 7 p.m. (ESPN+)
Saturday, June 1
Game 3 – Game 1 Loser vs. Game 2 Loser – 2 p.m. (TBD)
Game 4 – Game 1 Winner vs. Game 2 Winner – 8 p.m. (TBD)
Sunday, June 2
Game 5 – Game 3 Winner vs. Game 4 Loser – 1 p.m. (TBD)
Game 6 – Game 4 Winner vs. Game 5 Winner – 6 p.m. (TBD)
Monday, June 3 (If Necessary)
Game 7 – If the Game 5 Winner Wins Game 6 – TBD