The 1998 NCAA Division I baseball season, play of

college baseball College baseball is baseball that is played on the intercollegiate level at institutions of higher education. In comparison to football and basketball, college competition in the United States plays a smaller role in developing professional p ...

in the United States organized by the

National Collegiate Athletic Association The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges ...

(NCAA) began in the spring of 1998. The season progressed through the regular season and concluded with the 1998 College World Series. The College World Series, held for the fifty second time in 1998, consisted of one team from each of eight regional competitions and was held in

Omaha, Nebraska Omaha ( ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Nebraska and the county seat of Douglas County. Omaha is in the Midwestern United States on the Missouri River, about north of the mouth of the Platte River. The nation's 39th-largest cit ...

, at

Johnny Rosenblatt Stadium Johnny Rosenblatt Stadium was a baseball stadium in Omaha, Nebraska, the former home to the annual NCAA Division I College World Series and the minor league Omaha Royals, now known as the Omaha Storm Chasers. Rosenblatt Stadium was the largest m ...

as a double-elimination tournament.

Southern California Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and cultural region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. It includes the Los Angeles metropolitan area, the second most populous urban a ...

claimed the championship for the twelfth time, and first since 1978.

Realignment

Marshall Marshall may refer to: Places Australia * Marshall, Victoria, a suburb of Geelong, Victoria Canada * Marshall, Saskatchewan * The Marshall, a mountain in British Columbia Liberia * Marshall, Liberia Marshall Islands * Marshall Islands, an i ...

departed the Southern Conference and

Northern Illinois Northern Illinois is a region generally covering the northern third of the U.S. state of Illinois. The region is by far the most populous of Illinois with nearly 9.7 million residents as of 2010. Economics Northern Illinois is dominated by t ...

departed the

Midwestern Collegiate Conference The Horizon League is an 11-school collegiate athletic conference in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I, whose members are located in and near the Great Lakes region. The Horizon League founded in 1979 as the Midw ...

to join the

Mid-American Conference The Mid-American Conference (MAC) is a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) NCAA Division I, Division I collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference with a membership base in the Great Lakes region (North America), Great L ...

. * UNC Greensboro and Wofford joined the

Southern Conference The Southern Conference (SoCon) is a collegiate athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I. Southern Conference football teams compete in the Football Championship Subdivision (formerly k ...

. UNC Greensboro was in the Big South Conference, while Wofford joined from

NCAA Division II NCAA Division II (D-II) is an intermediate-level division of competition in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). It offers an alternative to both the larger and better-funded Division I and to the scholarship-free environmen ...

. * Marist and Rider left the

Northeast Conference The Northeast Conference (NEC) is a collegiate athletic conference whose schools are members of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). Teams in the NEC compete in Division I for all sports; football competes in the Division I Foo ...

for the

Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference The Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC, ) is a collegiate athletic conference affiliated with NCAA Division I. Of its current 11 full members, 10 are located in three states of the northeastern United States: Connecticut, New Jersey, and ...

. Marist joined the Northern Division, while Rider became a part of the Southern. * Southeastern Louisiana left the Trans America Athletic Conference and joined the

Southland Conference The Southland Conference, abbreviated as SLC, is a collegiate athletic conference which operates in the South Central United States (specifically Texas and Louisiana). It participates in the NCAA's Division I for all sports; for football, it ...

Format changes

*The

Big East Conference The Big East Conference is a collegiate athletic conference that competes in NCAA Division I in ten men's sports and twelve women's sports. Headquartered in New York City, the eleven full-member schools are primarily located in Northeast and ...

dissolved its divisions after one season. *The Mid-American Conference divided into two divisions of six. *The Southland Conference dissolved its divisions after two seasons.

Conference winners

This is a partial list of conference champions from the 1998 season. The NCAA sponsored regional competitions to determine the College World Series participants. Each of the eight regionals consisted of six teams competing in double-elimination tournaments, with the winners advancing to Omaha. In order to provide all conference champions with an automatic bid, 10 conference champions participated in a play-in round. The five winners joined the other 19 conference champions with automatic bids, 24 teams earned at-large selections.

Conference standings

The following is an incomplete list of conference standings:

College World Series

The 1998 season marked the fifty second NCAA Baseball Tournament, which culminated with the eight team

College World Series The College World Series (CWS), officially the NCAA Men's College World Series (MCWS), is an annual baseball tournament held in June in Omaha, Nebraska. The MCWS is the culmination of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Divisi ...

. The College World Series was held in

. The eight teams played a double-elimination format, with Southern California claiming their record twelfth championship with a 21–14 win over Arizona State in the final.

Realignment

Format changes

Conference winners

Conference standings

College World Series

Bracket

Award winners

All-America team

References