OXFORD | This will be the final season where SEC teams have to qualify for the conference tournament.

Starting in 2025, when Texas and Oklahoma join the SEC and expand the league to 16 teams, the Hoover, Alabama, event will continue to be six days but will be single elimination throughout the bracket.

Seeds 9 through 16, as determined by the final regular season standings, will play on the Tuesday of the tournament and seeds 5 through 8 will receive a bye to Wednesday. Seeds 1 through 4 will receive a double-bye to games on Thursday or Friday.

Currently, the top 12 teams in the final 14-team regular season standings participate in a hybrid single/double elimination tournament with single elimination games on Tuesday, Saturday and Sunday and double elimination on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

“It was highly debated in the meetings,” Ole Miss head coach Mike Bianco said. “It was pretty split, but personally I liked the old format. However, if we were going to a format with all 16 teams, this is by far the best way to do it.

“Once you knew you were going to 16 teams and everyone would go, we all felt better that this was unanimously the best tournament and makes the most sense. Like the basketball (SEC Tournament) format, you reward the teams that have done the best.”

The SEC’s strength nationally played into the decision, as inclusion in the event has at times been a relevant resume point for NCAA Tournament inclusion. The coaches put in a safeguard to protect a team that falls outside the top 12 in the SEC standings but has an at-large-worthy resume.

Ten teams are the most the SEC has ever put into the postseason, doing so four times, but Texas is one of the top programs nationally, and Oklahoma faced Ole Miss in the national title series two years ago.

A record eight SEC teams were regional hosts last season.

“That’s always part of the discussion, part of the argument to that with the 12 teams,” Bianco said. We used to have eight and then got nine in, and then you had a couple times with the ninth left out because of a stigma of not being in the conference tournament.

“Argument against is we haven’t had 12 in, but the counter is we haven’t had 16 teams with Texas and Oklahoma, and you don’t want to wait too late where someone is on the outside looking in.”

The SEC baseball regular season will continue with 30 conference games for each team over 10 weekends. Under the new scheduling format, each team will play two permanent opponents and eight rotating opponents on an annual basis, and standings will be kept in a single-standings format with no divisions.

Ole Miss has Mississippi State and Arkansas as its permanent opponents.

The SEC Tournament expanded from eight teams to 10 teams when Texas A&M and Missouri joined the league in 2012. A year later, the number of qualifying teams jumped from 10 to the current 12-team bracket.

Ole Miss has won the SEC Tournament three times - 1977, 2006 and 2018. That’s tied for the seventh-most in the SEC.

From 1948-1976, the SEC used a championship series format. The Rebels appeared in that 12 times and won it five times. That was the second most appearances and titles.

Tuesday

Game 1: Seed No. 9 vs. Seed No. 16

Game 2: Seed No. 12 vs. Seed No. 13

Game 3: Seed No. 10 vs. Seed No. 15

Game 4: Seed No. 11 vs. Seed No. 14

Wednesday

Game 5: Winner Game 1 vs. Seed No. 8

Game 6: Winner Game 2 vs. Seed No. 5

Game 7: Winner Game 3 vs. Seed No. 7

Game 8: Winner Game 4 vs. Seed No. 6

Thursday

Game 9: Winner Game 5 vs. Seed No. 1

Game 10: Winner Game 6 vs. Seed No. 4

Friday

Game 11: Winner Game 7 vs. Seed No. 2

Game 12: Winner Game 8 vs. Seed No. 3

Saturday

Game 13: Winner Game 9 vs. Winner Game 10

Game 14: Winner Game 11 vs. Winner Game 12

Sunday

Game 15: Championship - Winner Game 13 vs. Winner Game 14