The 2004 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 pl ...

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 an ...

(NCAA) at the Division I level, began on January 16, 2004. The season progressed through the regular season, many conference tournaments and championship series, and concluded with the 2004 NCAA Division I baseball tournament and 2004 College World Series. The College World Series, which consisted of the eight remaining teams in the NCAA tournament, was held in its annual location of

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

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 ...

. It concluded on June 27, 2004, with the final game of the best of three championship series.

Cal State Fullerton California State University, Fullerton (CSUF or Cal State Fullerton) is a public university in Fullerton, California. With a total enrollment of more than 41,000, it has the largest student body of the 23-campus California State University (CSU) ...

defeated

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...

two games to none to claim its fourth championship.

Realignment

New programs

Three programs joined Division I for the 2004 season.

Dallas Baptist Dallas Baptist University (DBU) is a Christianity, Christian liberal arts university in Dallas, Texas. Founded in 1898 as Decatur Baptist College, Dallas Baptist University currently operates campuses in Dallas, Plano, Texas, Plano, and Hurst, T ...

and

Northern Colorado Northern Colorado is the name for a region in the state of Colorado and a proposed state in the northeastern portion of Colorado. Region Northern Colorado is a region in the northern portion of Colorado. It borders northwestern Colorado, nort ...

joined from Division II, while

Utah Valley Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to its ...

joined from the

NJCAA The National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA), founded in 1938, is the governing association of community college, state college and junior college athletics throughout the United States. Currently the NJCAA holds 24 separate regions ...

Dropped programs

Two programs left Division I prior to the start of the season– Drexel, which dropped its varsity baseball program, and

Morris Brown Morris Brown (January 8, 1770 – May 9, 1849) was one of the founders of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, and its second presiding bishop. He founded Emanuel AME Church in his native Charleston, South Carolina. It was implicated in the sl ...

, which discontinued its varsity athletics program.

Conference changes

Both the

Ohio Valley Conference The Ohio Valley Conference (OVC) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference which operates in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern and Southeastern United States, Southeastern United States. It participates in NCAA Divisi ...

(OVC) and the Big South Conference (Big South) added two teams entering the season. The OVC added Jacksonville State and Samford, both from the

Atlantic Sun Conference The ASUN Conference, formerly the Atlantic Sun Conference, is a collegiate athletic conference operating mostly in the Southeastern United States. The league participates at the NCAA Division I level, and began sponsoring football at the Div ...

(A-Sun). The Big South added Birmingham–Southern, an independent, and VMI, a former

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 ...

(SoCon) member. To compensate for these moves, the A-Sun added Lipscomb, an independent, and the SoCon added Elon from the Big South. Two other schools realigned prior to the start of the season.

UMBC The University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) is a public research university in Baltimore County, Maryland. It has a fall 2022 enrollment of 13,991 students, 61 undergraduate majors, over 92 graduate programs (38 master, 25 doctoral, ...

moved from 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 ...

to the

America East Conference The America East Conference is a collegiate athletic conference affiliated with NCAA Division I founded in 1979, whose members are located in the Northeastern United States. The conference has nine core members including eight public research u ...

, and Centenary moved from being an

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

to the

Mid-Continent Conference The Summit League, or The Summit, is an NCAA Division I intercollegiate athletic conference with its membership mostly located in the Midwestern United States from Illinois on the East of the Mississippi River to the Dakotas and Nebraska on the W ...

Conference formats

Both the

Colonial Athletic Association The Colonial Athletic Association (CAA) is a collegiate athletic conference affiliated with the NCAA's Division I whose full members are located in East Coast states from Massachusetts to South Carolina. Most of its members are public universi ...

, which had competed in American and Colonial divisions, and the

Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference The Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference (MEAC) is a collegiate athletic conference whose full members are historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) in the Southeastern and the Mid-Atlantic United States. It participates in the National C ...

, which had competed in North and South divisions, eliminated their divisional formats.

Conference standings

College World Series

The 2004 season marked the fifty eighth 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

claiming their fourth championship with a two games to none series win over

in the final.

Bracket

Award winners

All-America team

References

2004 Division I Standings
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