DALLAS – I was surfing the internet for baseball stories last week and noticed this major development.
The 166th season of college baseball (two-year or four-year schools) actually begins this Friday, January 24.
Just snow you know, that isn’t a typographical error: teams such as Dallas Community College Brookhaven in Farmers Branch, TX, open activity a mere three days hence; in this case against Ranger (TX) College (west of Fort Worth), and the 10-day ballpark forecast for that afternoon is 50 degrees (F) with Northwest winds at 12 mph and a chill factor of 40-41 degrees. That is actually reasonably playable with some thermal outfits, and Rossley caps for those on the bench. Considerate umpires will even usually let pitchers blow on their pitching hand, just for warmth, of course!
It is a great day any time for college baseball, and this game and forecast bring back memories of Nebraska Huskers baseball in the 1980s and 1990s.
The prevailing practice in those times was that the Huskers would quickly schedule a game against nearby Doane, Nebraska Wesleyan, or Nebraska-Kearney if the thermometer edged above 50 degrees. Snow might have to be pushed onto the outfield warning tracks and hot coffee placed in the umpires’ dressing room, but then-Nebraska head coach John Sanders was determined to get in some contests before the expected March and April snowfalls blanketed Lincoln for days. If you question the veracity of this, kindly check with College Baseball Central godfather, and Omaha native, Noah Darling.
Then there was the case of Iowa State, which was forced to drop baseball due to weather and financial considerations after the 2001 campaign, ending 109 seasons. The 1998 Cyclones once played 32 consecutive games on the road, awaiting the spring thaw in Ames, IA, which sometimes did not occur until late April or early May. But hey, growing up in Omaha in the perennial shadow of Rosenblatt Stadium and not having a college baseball rooting interest beneficially may have been what prompted ISU grad Darling to create CBC (originally CWS247) in the first place.
Community colleges and NCAA Division II-III-NAIA members will generally open their seasons on Friday, February 7, some earlier, with regular-season schedules limited to less than the 56 contests of NCAA Division I. The NCAA set that DI limit beginning with the 1992 season, although some conferences such as the SEC began a 56-game maximum after the 1974 campaign. For the need of national unification, look no further than the days of College Baseball Hall of Fame coach Gene Stephenson and his freewheeling Wichita State squads.
The Shockers went on the road and traditionally started in late January or early February with massive slates, 88 games (68-20) in 1985 and before that, 87 contests (73-14) in 1982, as Stephenson's Men's College World Series runner-up team had quite the weary pitching staff when they finally reached Omaha that June.
Texas Tech head coach Larry Hays, coming off his ultra-success at NAIA power Lubbock Christian, used some of the same tactics in the 1980s and 1990s, playing contests in the late weeks of January to get a step ahead of colder region Southwest Conference opponents such as Arkansas, TCU, and Baylor. It worked in many of those campaigns, leading up to a 1997 Big 12 Conference regular-season title for Hays in the first year of that league.
The Big Ten Conference put an end to these early, early openers in 2012, when it proposed and influenced passage of an NCAA regulation keeping DI schools from playing games before the third Friday in February, or in years (such as 2025) with the third Friday falling on February 21, to open on February 14. The Big Ten also proposed but was defeated on a measure to allow 14 “counting” games in September and October for the allotted 56-game spring slate; and it even went as far as suggesting an April-August season for major college baseball, with the College World Series moved to mid-August.
To say the least, that did not sit well with the traditional Cape Cod/Northeast area and Alaska League summer amateur competition, along with 30-35 additional wood bat and summer amateur collegiate leagues nationwide.
The happy medium of 56 games (almost reduced to 50 regular-season by non-Sunbelt conferences 8-10 years ago) remains, with the NCAA Men's College World Series occurring in mid-June, rather than its first-week-of-June schedule from 1947-1998. The 1999 expansion of the NCAA DI field from 48 to 64 teams necessitated a second round for the eight Super Regionals and at least one extra week before the MCWS could begin.
And while we are on the subject of NCAA history, uniform number of authorized games, and starting date rules, here are some of the major all-collegiate division rules to watch in 2025 that gained approval of the NCAA Baseball Rules Committee:
*After an 11-player ejection due to an on-field altercation in 2024, and amended suspension of five of the players so that a third series game could be played under somewhat-normal conditions between Georgia and Mississippi State, the NCAA came up with a new rule stating that players who were already on the field at the time of an altercation will not be ejected or suspended, if "they are judged not to be a participant by their actions or not contributing to the escalation of an on-field confrontation."
*Another blip on the rules radar now allows electronic one-way communication devices used to call pitches, such as PitchCom, now to be used by any player on the field as well as by base coaches. Teams may also use tablets to access scouting and analytic information in the dugout.
*Also on the ’25 new rules checklist: the NCAA will require bat testing to be conducted the day before each game. Previously, bat testing had to be conducted only prior to each series. And speaking of bats, bat sensor technology will also be used to collect in-game swing data.
*The NCAA also has changed the pitch clock rules, first used in 2023, to require batters to be alert to the pitcher within 12 seconds. Previously, batters had 10 seconds.
*And, it won't go into effect until August and the 2026 season, but the NCAA just last week announced an increase in the amount of practice time permitted schools before the season. Teams now have 35 days in which to conduct up to 27 sessions, up from the previous 21 days in which to conduct up to 18 sessions. As for fall practice, a proposal to increase permitted autumn exhibitions with other teams from two to four was tabled for now.
Earlier this month at its convention in Washington, DC, the consensus emerging from the ABCA was in favor of a roster of 38 to be effective December 1 this year, but there has been nothing official from the NCAA yet.
So, do you feel ready for the early season games to begin, new rules and all?
The 2025 campaign essentially is here and awaiting fans’ interest at nearby ballparks sooner than you may have realized – weather permitting, that is. You may need to dress in layers and keep a thermos of coffee or hot chocolate handy, but trust me, it's well worth it!
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Bo Carter is the Executive Director of the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association (NCBWA) and is a long time professional in sports media and information. He is a graduate of Vanderbilt University and has plied his trade in the Southeastern Conference, the Southwest Conference, and the Big 12 Conference. In addition to his NCBWA duties, he also serves as a consultant and columnist for the National Football Foundation. Follow the NCBWA, which produces ranking polls for D1, D2, and D3, as well as naming All America teams at both the D1 and D2 levels and the Dick Howser Trophy (presented each year in Omaha at the Men’s College World Series) at @NCBWA. And, if you’re a college baseball fan, you don’t have to be media to be a member, check them out at ncbwa.com and join today!
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