Las Vegas Ballpark not among sites for NCAA baseball regionals
Las Vegas was under consideration to host an NCAA baseball regional, but the organization on Sunday did not award the city one of its 16 sites.
UC Santa Barbara would have served as the host school, but the Gauchos’ RPI ranking dropped 10 places to No. 21. Three Pac-12 Conference schools — No. 1 UCLA, No. 10 Stanford and No. 20 Oregon State — were picked as sites.
Had UC Santa Barbara been selected a host school, Las Vegas Ballpark was expected to be the venue. The Gauchos don’t have lights at their stadium, an NCAA requirement for a stadium.
It would have marked the first NCAA championship event in Las Vegas since 1998 when the UNLV men’s and women’s tennis teams hosted regionals. The NCAA banned events in states with legal sports betting in 2009, but reversed course earlier this month.
Contact Mark Anderson at manderson@reviewjournal.com. Follow @markanderson65 on Twitter.