As most know by now, Liberty was not one of the 64 teams selected for the NCAA baseball tournament. With 42 victories, Liberty has more wins than anybody left out of the tournament field. But did the Flames get jobbed?

In a word: No.

The Flames finished ranked 45th in the RPI according to WarrenNolan.com, which put them squarely on the NCAA bubble. But a closer look at those numbers reveals a major problem for the Flames. They were 0-7 against the RPI top 50 and 9-3 against teams ranked 200-plus. They went 18-9 against teams ranked 51-100. Simply put, the Flames didn’t beat anyone of note and lost three games they had no business losing.

Of those 42 victories, only four came against NCAA tournament teams, and none came against at-large selections. The Flames won two games against VCU and took two out of three against St. John’s. So that’s 38 victories against non-postseason teams, and that’s just not an NCAA at-large profile.

All year long, Flames coach Jim Toman said he thought getting to 40 victories would be enough to merit a bid. But I think he knew deep down that one of those 40 victories had to come against Coastal Carolina. And Liberty’s non-conference schedule left the Flames with absolutely no margin for error in Big South play. Two losses each to UNC Asheville, High Point and Winthrop were killers, and when the Flames desperately needed a sweep at the end of the regular season at Winthrop, they lost two out of three to a team that didn’t even finish .500.

On this afternoon’s selection show, I thought analyst Kyle Peterson made a great point. A lot of bubble teams played their way out of it during the stretch run, and not many played their way into the tournament. Liberty certainly fits that bill. Losing five out of seven at the end of the regular season was a killer for this team.

Now that the Flames have seen that 40 wins alone won’t be enough to secure a bid, what has to change? For one, the non-conference schedule. The Flames only played two top-50 teams out of conference and went 0-3 in those games, falling twice to Elon and once to Virginia Tech. Elon had a lower RPI than the Flames, but the Phoenix proved it could beat Top 50 teams (7-9 in such contests) and Elon beat the Flames twice. There was no way Liberty was going to get a bid over Elon.

Let’s take a look at some of the non-conference schedules of the mid-major teams that did make the field of 64:

ELON—vs. Rice and Nebraska (at Rice Invitational); two games at Clemson (both wins); at East Carolina, vs. East Carolina; at North Carolina (split two games); at N.C. State (won).

COLLEGE OF CHARLESTON—vs. Alabama, vs. Coastal Carolina, at Coastal Carolina (the Cougars won both), at South Carolina, at North Carolina

FLORIDA ATLANTIC—vs. Auburn and Boston College (at Auburn tournament); three more vs. B.C. at home (two wins); vs. Pittsburgh (win); two at Miami and one vs. Miami (0-3); at Florida Gulf Coast (A-Sun reg. season champ); vs. Bethune-Cookman (MEAC champ); at Florida (loss)

Lots of good, big names on all of those schedules. Liberty’s non-conference consisted of teams that were hit and miss. UNC Wilmington has been good in the past, but not this season. Same with Kennesaw State. The only ACC teams on the schedule were Virginia Tech, Duke and Maryland, and the latter two schools are traditionally awful. Liberty did get St. John’s to come to Lynchburg, but that was about it. When Coastal Carolina started making the transition from good Big South team to national player, the Chanticleers went on the road and played games against South Carolina, Clemson, North Carolina, East Carolina, etc.

Those games were absent from Liberty’s schedule, meaning the Flames HAD to perform in the games against Elon, Virginia Tech and Coastal Carolina. When they came up empty in those games, so did their regional hopes.