Two teams that have traveled similar roads to being among the elite in college baseball square off Monday night as #3 national seed Virginia faces Vanderbilt in the first game of their best of three series to decide college baseball's national champion.  First pitch is scheduled for 7pm.

Virginia (52-14) is undefeated in the College World Series after winning their best two out of three series against Maryland to earn a berth in the CWS.  The Cavaliers defeated Ole Miss twice and TCU to get to the championship series.

Vanderbilt (49-20) is 3-1 at the College World Series, defeating Texas Tech, UC Irvine and splitting two games with Texas.  Vandy is the eighth consecutive team from the Southeastern Conference to advance to the CWS championship.

Conversely, no team from the Atlantic Coast Conference has won the title since Wake Forest did it...nearly 60 years ago.

One of the great side stories of this series is how the two coaches, Tim Corbin of Vanderbilt and Bryan O'Connor of Virginia, breathed life into baseball programs that were on a respirator, success-wise.  Aaron Fitt of Baseball America has a great preview of the series and the story within the story here.

 

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