Final day of the regular season!

Today is the final day of the college baseball regular season, and there is plenty riding on the line for teams from Baton Rouge to Blacksburg. Some teams are playing for the number one seed in their conference tournaments and some are just trying to get into the tournament.

So here are today's situations for the SEC, Big South, and ACC that you need to be listening and watching for...

BIG SOUTH

Let's start with the Big South because its pretty simple. Coastal Carolina locked in the #1 seed in the tournament yesterday for the 6th consecutive season by winning game one over Charleston Southern. They added to their RPI by winning game two and look to finish off the series sweep today. Coach Gary Gilmore sat his star catcher Tucker Frawley in game two, Tyler Herb pitched limited innings in game one, so the Chants are certainly in post-season preparation mode. But who will they play on Tuesday and what time...

High Point is playing for their post-season lives. The conference tournament is on a rotation basis and this year it hits High Point which increases the pressure today. Winthrop and High Point are closing out the season playing for the #8 seed. Only 8 teams make the conference tournament and Presbyterian is ineligible for the post season this year in conference play. If High Point wins today's finale, they are in. And as the host team they get the feature 8:00 game on Tuesday night. So that means CCU would play host High Point in the #1 vs. #8 match up on Tuesday. So #8 gets to host? That's the way it works sometimes. If Winthrop wins then CCU will play Winthrop on Tuesday at 4:30 when the #1 vs. #8 game is currently planned. Last time the two teams met was what turned out to be the final game at Watson Stadium last Saturday and Winthrop got the win. CCU doesn't care who they get, they just want to play some baseball. And as the station Sports Director, I just want to know if I have a show on Tuesday or not!

SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE

On to the SEC which has CRAZY story lines going today. The Gamecocks could be the #1 overall seed, or as low as the #4 seed. Here's the situation...

The #1 and #2 seeds go to the two division winners based on conference winning percentage, NOT the two best teams but as it turns out its going to likely work out that way. Seeds #3-#10 are based purely on overall winning percentage, doesn't matter what division you play in or what your division record is! But those things typically co-relate. So here are the top four seeds and how things work today:

As I said, USC is overall #1 with a .643 conference winning percentage right now. Kentucky and Florida are a 1/2 game back with a .621 winning percentage. So the Eastern Division is intense today on the final day of the season. Before I get into those details... what about the West? It's done. LSU is at worst the #2 seed, but they get the #1 seed if they beat USC tonight. Either way they get a bye and will not play on Tuesday. They are three games ahead of 2nd place Arkansas.

So back to the East. If USC wins today they are the #1 seed in the tournament. Simple. Easy. Just Win Baby. If they lose... things get very interesting because they could still be #2, #3 or #4. They want to be #1 or #2 because in a 10 team tournament that's one less day and one less game you have to play to win the conference. Also if you win the SEC Regular Season title there is no way you don't get one of the eight national seeds with home field advantage all the way through to Omaha. Is that important? Last year 6 of the 8 College World Series teams were national seeds.

A loss today for USC plus a loss for UK against Mississippi State (UK is reeling. They have gone from regular season champion to having lost 3 in a row to Murray State and Mississippi State so if they don't make something happen in the next week they will not be a national seed), and a loss for Florida who is playing Auburn, will leave USC as the #2 seed. If either of those teams win, then they pass USC. So one of them winning makes USC the #3 seed. Both of them winning means USC is the #4 seed. Crazy stuff.

How about the bottom of the standings? Anyone playing their way in? Nope. Tennessee and Alabama will not make the SEC tournament. So everyone else is just playing for seeding today.

ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE

And finally on to the last conference we cover in Myrtle Beach... the ACC. Let's talk about the format first. This is why people either love or hate college athletics. Conferences can't even agree on a similar format. The NCAA Tournament doesn't even play the same format in each section. It goes from a four team double elimination pod in round one, to a best of 3 between two team Super Regional, to a double elimination eight team college world series.

So the Big South is an 8 team double elimination, just like the College World Series. What a concept. Why doesn't everyone just do that? Who knows. The SEC plays a 10 team format with #1 and #2 getting byes on day one. It it double elimination from Tuesday - Friday, but once you get to the semifinals and finals on Saturday and Sunday it becomes single elimination. And then there's the ACC. The ACC is a 12 team conference with two 6 team divisions, just like the SEC. The ACC allows 8 teams in, like the SEC used to do until this year, and like the Big South currently does. The eight teams are seeded #1-#8. But then they are divided up into two four team pods that do not play double elimination like the 1st round of the World Series, but play a Round Robin tournament so that everyone gets three games. And the confusion doesn't stop there. Pod one is seeds #1, #4, #5, and #8. Pod two is seeds #2, #3, #6, and #7. If you can follow the NCAA Rules handbook... then it makes sense! AND these 8 seeds are not the overall 8 seeds in the conference but they are the top 4 seeds from each division, then re-seeded 1-8 based on winning percentage. I get that the ACC has a lot of schools that are difficult to get into academically, but are they trying to confuse everyone who struggled with math in school? Stop letting the Engineers at Virginia Tech come up with your post season format! Ask a guy from Tuscaloosa. He'll come up with something we can all understand... and then he'll poison your trees that have been in your family for 9 generations.

Concerning seeds, #1 will be Florida State. #2 will be North Carolina. But the Tar Heels are the hottest team in America riding a 12-game winning streak into the final day of the regular season. Let me see a show of hands for who wants to play those guys right now. AND the tournament is in Greensboro. Which leads to two random thoughts real quick...

1) Wasn't the tournament supposed to be in Myrtle Beach at the Pelicans Stadium? Oh yea it was... but the NAACP got involved and was going to boycott it because the state of SC has not removed the confederate flag from the State House grounds. So goodbye tens of thousands in revenue for our servers, hoteliers, and that balloon guy I saw at the Outback last night (I'm being serious with that one, my wife and I declined the balloon animal because we're older than 12 and wanted to spend our money on Skinny Margaritas for her, and Stella Artois for me). But this is for a whole other column that will probably come... next week!

2) Didn't FSU's president say a good reason to leave the ACC was that it was to North Carolina-centric? I'm sure he's not thrilled about his #1 Seminoles traveling to Greensboro to try to win this tournament.

Outside of the top seeds... Maryland, BC and Duke are out. There is one story line to watch and that is Virginia Tech and Georgia Tech who are deadlocked for the #8 overall seed, and 4th place in the Coastal Division. Virginia Tech has the upper hand because their overall record is significantly better. So if the Hokies win today, they are in. If they lose but GT also loses to Miami (which has happened the last two days) they are in.

Come back to this blog tomorrow and I'll have the seeding's and game times for all three conference tournaments!

Aaron Marks is the Sports Director for ESPN Radio 100.3 The Team in Myrtle Beach, SC and the host of "The Drive" which airs daily from 4-6 p.m. 
Follow Aaron on Twitter @AMonFM, follow his station @1003theteam