John Savage encourages Big Ten teams to schedule better to get more teams to College World Series

In their first season in the Big Ten, the UCLA Bruins and head coach John Savage went all the way to the College World Series. Now, Savage is looking for a way to expand the entire conference’s profile nationally.

After UCLA was eliminated, Savage encouraged other Big Tent teams to put together more challenging schedules. That way their BPI, one of the key metrics used to determine the Field of 64, is improved and they will be able to get more teams into the field as a conference.

“I think everybody just has to schedule better,” John Savage said. “At the end of the day, it has a chance to have a really good RPI because a lot of the Big Ten teams from the other part of the country have to play a lot of road games. So, their RPI does get pretty good. There was some really good teams. Indiana was good. Penn State was good. Iowa was good. Clearly, Oregon was good. USC was very good. It’s hard. It’s hard to get into the tournament just the way it’s set up, but I just think us coaches have to get together and make sure we build these schedules out to where everybody’s RPI is, you know, relatively high.”

This season, the Big Ten had two teams host NCAA Regionals. That was with four total teams getting bids, including Nebraska who stole a bid by winning the conference tournament. That was the fourth most bids for any conference. However, it severely trailed the other three Power Four conferences. The Big 12 had eight teams, the ACC had nine teams, and the SEC got 13 teams in the field. Increasing the difficulty of nonconference schedules could help close that gap.

John Savage admitted that it’s about more than just playing tough teams. You have to win games too. However, it would still go a long way in raising the Big Ten’s profile.

“You’ve got to win games. You can build a schedule, but you’ve got to win games. So, you know, but I think you should have to play the right people in the right spots. So, I think it’s going to take the whole conference to get together to make sure people are doing their part to build their RPI and build their schedules outside of conference because inside of conference it is what it is,” Savage said. “But I have extremely high hopes for the Big Ten. Just being through it, like I said several times, it has a chance of having a really good future in baseball.”

UCLA in its first season in the conference went further than any other Big Ten school. Now, they’re going to go into the offseason looking to find a way to win the College World Series next year. The next Big Ten team to win it all will be the first from the conference to do so since Ohio State in 1966.

John Savage shares what College World Series run says about UCLA baseball

This was the first run to the College World Series for UCLA since they won it in 2013. That was also with John Savage coaching the team and now he believes that this run meant a lot to the program.

“It’s a tough tournament. I thought they represented themselves well. Oregon State beat Florida State. Arizona went to North Carolina and won that. We beat a really good UTSA team that beat up Texas,” Savage said.

“This is a hard tournament and to be still playing on Tuesday, I guess, the rain, that was a tough situation. To play last night and play this morning and come back, you wouldn’t draw that up for anybody. But, you know, at the same time I’m not making any sort of excuses. But a lot of good players in the West. A lot of good coaches in the West. I think it has a bright future.”