OMAHA, NE ― Dave Van Horn has built Arkansas into one of college baseball’s best powerhouses. Under Van Horn, the Razorbacks have made the NCAA tournament 21 times with eight College World Series appearances. Van Horn himself has been named SEC Coach of the Year three times.
But there’s one accolade still missing: a national championship. And the route to that feat got a lot harder with Arkansas’ 4-1 loss to LSU on June 14 in its Men’s College World Series opener at Charles Schwab Field to drop to the losers’ bracket. The Razorbacks will face Murray State in an elimination game June 16.
Arkansas is one of the best programs nationally to never win a national title. Entering 2025, its 11 trips to Omaha without a title were fourth in the country after Florida State (24), North Carolina (12) and Clemson (12).
But Clemson hasn’t made it to Omaha since 2010, and Florida State and North Carolina have been in and out of relevance. Arkansas has made five of the last 10 College World Series; meanwhile, in that span, Florida State has gone three times, North Carolina twice and Clemson not at all.
The Razorbacks’ road to the title will be a long and difficult one. They’ll need to win four games in four days to even advance to the championship series, then two of their final three should they stave off elimination. In the last 25 tournaments, 22 champions won their first game.
Van Horn should be familiar with one of the teams that didn’t, though — 2018 Oregon State, the team that beat Arkansas in the championship series after three Razorbacks failed to catch what would’ve been a championship-clinching pop-up.
Since then, the postseason has been full of heartbreak. The 2019 team went to Omaha but lost two one-run games to get eliminated. The 2021 team was the No. 1 national seed and heavy title favorite but dropped a home super regional to NC State. The 2023 and 2024 teams both lost home regionals as national seeds. Only the 2022 team — the only Arkansas team since 2016 to not host a regional — did well in Omaha, making it to the semifinals.
‘We need to move on from this one and get over it and not think too far down the road,’ Van Horn said. ‘We’ve just got to take care of business on Monday. We need to play good Monday because if we don’t there’s no Tuesday. … These guys, they’ve come back and won games. They’ve done some great things this year. So that’s what I told them. We’ve got a bullpen full of pitchers. We’ve got a bunch of hitters that can hit. They didn’t have a good night. We need to move on and get ready for Monday.’
Van Horn will face some tricky decisions with his pitching. He said the likely starter for the elimination game was Gage Wood. After that, he could turn to Landon Beidelschies, Aiden Jimenez or Colin Fisher. Starter Zach Root, who lasted just 1⅔ innings and threw 38 pitches, could return as soon as Tuesday. But relief ace Gabe Gaeckle, who pitched a career-high six innings out of the bullpen, likely won’t be available until at least the semifinals, if Arkansas makes it that far.
In theory, if anyone has the pitching and offensive depth to make a run through the losers’ bracket, it’s the Razorbacks. Arkansas ranks top-15 nationally in on-base plus slugging percentage (OPS), home runs and ERA. While Root has been a solid arm, the Razorbacks have thrived all season without a true ace to the level of LSU’s Kade Anderson, who threw seven innings of one-run ball in the opener. Instead, Arkansas has the sort of reliable relief options that every team longs for. And its starting lineup for the opener featured seven players with double-digit home runs.
‘No one here is worried,’ outfielder Charles Davalan said. ‘We’ll try to be ready by Monday and play hard.’
The Razorbacks have won four games in four or fewer days once this season, when they swept Washington State on opening weekend. But the College World Series is an entirely different challenge, and it’s one Van Horn will need to solve for the first time to finally get the monkey off his back.
Aria Gerson covers Vanderbilt athletics for The Tennessean. Contact her at agerson@gannett.com or on X @aria_gerson.