In consecutive years, the top-ranked seed has been eliminated from the NCAA baseball regionals. The UCLA campaign concluded following a 6-5 defeat against Saint Mary’s in an extended play period.
Saint Mary’s secured the narrow victory after forcing additional innings with a tying score in the final frame of regulation. Subsequently, Saint Mary’s surprised the Bruins in the tenth inning when Makoa Sniffen delivered a decisive base hit, allowing Cody Kashimoto to score the winning run. Both critical runs batted in occurred with two outs recorded.
This marked the second instance in a three-day span that UCLA suffered an unexpected loss to Saint Mary’s. The Gaels initially surprised the Bruins during the regional’s inaugural match on Friday. Jacob Johnson put his team ahead with a solo home run in the ninth inning, and Cam Staton completed the pitching performance to seal a 3-2 triumph for Saint Mary’s.
Before the year 2025, according to ESPN, no top seed had ever failed to advance at least to the regional final. Currently, UCLA follows Vanderbilt, which was defeated by Wright State last year, becoming the second consecutive top-seeded team to exit prematurely.
Saint Mary’s is set to compete against Cal Poly next, aiming to remain in contention, in a repeat matchup following the Gaels’ significant 14-1 defeat to the Mustangs on Saturday. Given the double-elimination format of this tournament phase, Saint Mary’s must secure two victories against Cal Poly (one on Sunday and another on Monday) to progress.
Conversely, UCLA will be returning home. This premature departure for the Bruins additionally signifies another disappointing performance from the Big Ten in baseball, with Oregon and USC remaining as the sole representatives from the conference — for the time being.
