UNC was eliminated from the NCAA Baseball Tournament in the regional round on Sunday night ending the Heels' streak of CWS appearances at four. The Heels, despite playing much better over the last half of the season, simply came up short vs home standing Oklahoma in the Norman Regional.
UNC opened regional play on Friday with a 12-3 win over California. On Saturday night they took the Sooners to extra innings before falling 7-6 in the 10th. UNC bounced back in an elimination game against Oral Roberts to plate 12 runs on the way to a 12-4 win on Sunday afternoon. The Heels then had to turn around and face Oklahoma a few hours later falling 3-2.
Given this was easily a rebuilding year for UNC following an impressive CWS run, the result was not all bad. And if you are looking for a bit of comfort, UNC did manage two wins and was competitive in their two losses. The same could not be said for NC State whose coach, Eliot Avent, did a fair amount of griping concerning UNC's inclusion in the NCAA Tournament ahead of Boston College despite the latter missing the ACC Tournament while the Eagles made the trip to Greensboro. NCSU was swept out of the regional with two quick losses, the final one to Stony Brook who plated six in the first inning which was all the offense they needed. To paraphrase Roy Williams maybe Avent should have worried about coaching his own darn team instead of who made the NCAA Tournament.