The Sun Belt received just two bids to the NCAA Tournament last year, yet remained one of the final two leagues standing as Coastal Carolina made an impressive run to the national championship before falling to LSU. Entering the new season, the league is again expected to be paced by Coastal and longtime mid-major power Southern Miss, though the depth of talent across the conference suggests it is far from a two-team race.

Baseball America subscribers can find our complete 2026 Sun Belt preview below, featuring projected order of finish, top 2026 MLB Draft prospects and conference award picks.

Projected Sun Belt Standings (2025 Record)

Coastal Carolina (56-13; 26-4 Sun Belt)

Southern Mississippi (47-16; 24-6)

Troy (39-21; 18-12)

Marshall (33-26; 16-14)

Louisiana (27-31; 16-14)

Texas State (27-31; 14-16)

Georgia Southern (28-31; 13-17)

Arkansas State (26-28; 14-16) 

Old Dominion (22-31; 15-15) 

Appalachian State (23-31; 13-17)

South Alabama (23-28; 12-18)

James Madison (17-38; 10-20) 

Georgia State (26-30; 11-19)

Louisiana-Munroe (22-33; 8-22)

Top 10 Sun Belt Draft Prospects For 2026

Cameron Flukey, RHP, Coastal Carolina

Hayden Johnson, LHP, Coastal Carolina

Ben Stubbs, LHP, Troy

Ross Norman, RHP, Coastal Carolina

Chase Morgan, LHP, Louisiana

McCarty English, RHP Southern Miss

Wills Maginnis, 1B, Georgia State

Dominick Carbone, LHP, Coastal Carolina

AJ Havrilla, 1B/3B, Marshall

Zach Crotchfelt, LHP, Troy

Sun Belt Team to Beat: Coastal Carolina

Coastal Carolina made history in its first season under head coach Kevin Schnall, a longtime Gary Gilmore assistant who authored one of the most impressive debut campaigns in NCAA history. Schnall became just the fourth first-year head coach to guide a team to the College World Series and the only one to win his CWS debut.

Coastal advanced to the national championship series before falling to LSU. Along the way, Coastal opened the NCAA Tournament with eight straight wins, the most ever by a rookie skipper, and Schnall’s 56 victories in 2025 set a Division I record for a first-year head coach. He became the first first-year coach to win College Coach of the Year.

The Chants do lose their top battery in ace Jacob Morrison and catcher Caden Bodine, but their foundation remains intact. Coastal returns the top-ranked pitcher in the 2026 draft and Preseason Pitcher of the Year, righthander Cameron Flukey, along with several key bullpen arms and critical pieces of a lineup that proved it could handle the sport’s biggest stage. Coastal enters 2026 positioned to compete again on the national scale.

Sun Belt Preseason Player of the Year

Matthew Russo, 1B, Southern Miss

Russo enters his senior season as one of the most proven, physically mature offensive players in the conference and a very safe bet to anchor a contender’s lineup. Russo hit .290/.407/.563 with 18 home runs while producing some of the loudest contact in the league last year. Though he’ll expand the zone at times, he punishes mistakes at an above-average clip for a power-first hitter. That combination of physicality, experience and proven production should make him difficult to neutralize over the course of a season, especially at the front of a lineup with postseason aspirations.

Sun Belt Preseason Pitcher of the Year

Cameron Flukey, RHP, Coastal Carolina

Flukey enters the season as the most complete and bankable arm in the conference after an outstanding sophomore campaign in 2025. He pitched to a 3.19 ERA while striking out a team-best 118 hitters against just 24 walks over 101.2 innings, combining frontline workload with consistent swing-and-miss ability. Few pitchers in the country matched his blend of durability, strike-throwing and pure stuff.

A long, lean righthander with an exaggerated layback and loose, athletic delivery, Flukey rifles his fastball to the plate in the mid-to-upper 90s. The pitch plays even harder thanks to its elite carry, giving Flukey one of the most overpowering fastball profiles in the nation. He also took meaningful steps forward with his curveball ahead of his draft season. With proven production, frontline stuff and the trust to shoulder a heavy load, Flukey opens the year as the safest bet in the league to perform like an ace.

Sun Belt Preseason Freshman of the Year

Blaze Rodriguez, SS, Louisiana

Rodriguez enters the season with preseason momentum after earning the trust of coach Matt Deggs, who called him the best freshman newcomer he has coached in his career. That confidence translated quickly into opportunity, as Rodriguez was named Louisiana’s starting shortstop to open the season, positioning him to play a premium role from day one and compete immediately for conference freshman of the year honors.

An athletic middle infielder with an advanced internal clock and above-average arm strength, Rodriguez brings defensive stability at one of the most demanding positions on the field. He moves well laterally, fields the ball cleanly and shows the instincts required to handle the speed of the college game. The offensive profile is lighter at present, and Rodriguez will need to prove his bat can keep pace against more advanced pitching in the Sun Belt.

Notable Storylines

Bids up for grabs? The Sun Belt narrowly missed out on a third NCAA Tournament bid last season when Troy was left out of the field, despite a résumé that appeared worthy of consideration. The committee ultimately stopped at two bids, though, giving the league the unusual distinction of producing multiple regional hosts without an additional at-large selection. It marked the Sun Belt’s lowest tournament representation since 2021, when it sent just one team to the field. Every year since, the conference had earned four total bids.

Entering 2026, Sun Belt Conference stalwarts Coastal Carolina and Southern Miss appear as close to tournament locks as any teams can be before Opening Day. Troy once again looks like a club capable of building an at-large case, while Marshall returns intriguing depth that could position it for a similar push.

Coastal & Southern Miss are clear favorites: Parity has been far more elusive in the Sun Belt tournament than the league’s regular season race. No team has won back-to-back regular-season conference titles since South Alabama in 2015 and 2016, yet the conference tournament has been dominated by a small group for more than a decade.

Dating back to 2014, only Coastal Carolina, Southern Miss, South Alabama and Louisiana have claimed the league’s automatic bid, with no other program breaking through in that span. With Coastal and Southern Miss again returning rosters built to contend nationally, that stranglehold remains difficult to envision being challenged, even as the league continues to field several teams capable of testing it.