FSU Softball Claims No. 4 National Seed

The NCAA Softball Tournament brackets were unveiled on Sunday night and Florida State was among 16 teams to earn a national seed. The good news for the Seminoles is that to get to Oklahoma City, they won’t have to leave Tallahassee.

FSU will be the No. 4 national seed and will open the NCAA Tournament against Princeton in the Tallahassee Regional on Friday. Joining the Seminoles and Tigers in the regional will be the region’s No. 2 seed Georgia and No. 3 seed Jacksonville State.

The Bulldogs actually handed the Seminoles one of their two defeats in last year’s College World Series, but finished just 33-21 during the regular season this year. Jacksonville State was 40-10 on the year while fourth-seeded Princeton was 25-18. The double-elimination regional will last through next Sunday.

Florida State was the No. 8 national seed in last year’s NCAA Tournament before advancing to the semifinals of the Women’s College World Series. FSU clinched a fourth straight ACC title on Saturday with a 4-3 win over North Carolina in the final of the ACC Tournament. FSU, the region’s top seed, is 51-6-1 on the year.

The three teams seeded higher nationally than FSU was No. 1 seed Florida, second-seeded Arizona and No. 3 seed Oregon. The Seminoles split a pair of meetings with Florida this year, but were swept in a 3-game series at Oregon to close the regular season.

The contest with Princeton is slated to begin about 7 p.m. EST on Friday in Tallahassee and will air on ESPNU. The Georgia-Jacksonville State match-up will precede the Seminoles and Tigers and will air at 4:30 p.m. EST on ESPN2.

Mike Ferguson is the editor of The Daily Nole. Follow Mike on Twitter @MikeWFerguson