May 30, 2004
For the third time in the last four years, the University of Notre Dame will play host to one of 16 NCAA baseball regionals at Frank Eck Stadium – with games in the four-team, double-elimination regional to be played from Friday, June 4 through Sunday, June 6.
Notre Dame will be playing host to NCAA tournament action for the seventh time in the program’s history and for the fourth time since the field adopted the current 64-team, 16-regional format in 1999. During the six-year span of the current format, Notre Dame now has been a host site four times (’99, ’01, ’02 and ’04) – with only LSU (6), Florida State (6), Stanford (6) and Miami (5) serving as hosts more times during the past six seasons. Notre Dame’s streak of hosting three of the past four years also is bested by just four other teams, as LSU, FSU, Stanford and Rice are the only teams to be regional hosts every year from 2001-04.
The entire 64-team field, regional pairings and top-8 national seeds will be announced on ESPN2 on Monday, May 31, at 11:00 a.m. CDT.
The other 15 host sites for the 2004 NCAA Regionals include Arkansas, Cal State Fullerton, East Carolina, Florida State, Georgia, Georgia Tech, LSU, Miami, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Rice, South Carolina, Stanford, Texas and Virginia.
Notre Dame’s other two seasons as an NCAA tournament host came in 1949 and 1959, under the old district playoff system.
Regional tickets will go on sale to the general public on Tuesday, June 1 (the ND Ticket Office will not be open on Memorial Day).
Notre Dame tentatively would play in the early game at 2:00 p.m. EST (South Bend time) on the first day of the Regional (June 4), pending NCAA approval. Regional formats include two games on day-1, three on day-2 (losers game, winners game and a second elimination game) and then the championship round (one game, then a second if necessary) on day-3.
Tickets may be purchased at the ND Athletics Ticket Office (located on the second floor of the Joyce Center) or by calling (574) 631-7356. Ticket pricing will be as follows:
* Adult all-session (6-7 games) reserved – $32
* Adult all-session general admission – $24
* Youth/student all-session reserved/GA – $16
* Adult single-game reserved – $12
* Adult single-game GA – $10
* Youth/student single-game reserved/GA – $6