UConn selected for NCAA baseball tournament

After suffering a 12-2 shellacking to eventual Big East champ Seton Hall in the Big East Tournament semifinals on Saturday ("It was an embarrassment," coach Jim Penders said), it was touch and go whether the UConn baseball team would qualify for the NCAA baseball tournament.

Sure, the Huskies were 41-17 and have two first-round-MLB Draft-quality players, but they do play in what is regarded as a generally terrible conference, and they went south during the Big East Tournament in every phase of the game.

That's not just me being paranoid: the Hartford Courant's Dom Amore, who watched Monday afternoon's NCAA Selection Show with the team, reported the following on Twitter:

Room erupts. They were getting worried

But hey, there was no need to worry at all. (And the Big East, apparently, is not so terrible, as St. John's grabbed a second at-large spot for the league ahead of teams like LSU).

UConn was selected as an at-large for the 2011 College World Series - and comfortably, as a #2 seed, to boot! - and the Huskies are headed to Clemson, S.C. George Springer, Matt Barnes and company will take on third-seeded Coastal Carolina in the opening round Friday night.

Top-seeded Clemson will take on Sacred Heart in the other game. It looks like the winner of this regional will advance to next weekend's Super Regionals against the Columbia, S.C. regional (helmed by top-seeded defending national champ South Carolina.)

In case you're new to this college baseball game, allow me to explain how the whole shebang works, below the jump.

Each segment of the NCAA baseball tournament is a double-elimination mini-tournament.

• The first weekend, which will run from this Friday to Sunday, features 64 teams split up into 16 four-team regional brackets, to be held at 16 pre-announced sites.
• The second weekend, June 10-12, features the 16 regional winners paired off in the Super Regional round. There will be eight best-of-three series at the site of the higher seeded team, with the winners advancing to the College World Series proper in Omaha.
• The third weekend/week will feature the eight Super Regional winners split into two four-team, double-elimination brackets.
  
• The two winners of those brackets play a best-of-three series to determine the national champion.

Got it? Good. Now it's time to put a hurt on whatever a Chanticleer is.