When does the College World Series start? CWS format, bracket details, elimination and more

The College World Series is set to start on Friday, June 14, with the North Carolina Tar Heels, Virginia Cavaliers, Tennessee Volunteers, Florida State Seminoles, Kentucky Wildcats, NC State Wolfpack, Texas A&M Aggies and Florida Gators fighting for a chance to win the national title. In a show of force by the SEC and the ACC, all the qualified schools for the Omaha tournament are from said conferences.

The Tennessee Volunteers are the No. 1 national seed and the undisputed favorites. The Vols already are the SEC regular season and SEC tournament champions. If they were to win the College World Series, it would be the first in the school's history.

College World Series format and bracket details

The College World Series consists of four rounds, with the final round being a best-of-three series. The losers of the first round drop to the "losing side" of the bracket. In a somewhat controversial format, the winners of the first round advance to play against each other and the losers with other losers.

Losers of the second round drop to the losing side of the bracket to play against the winners of the "elimination games" between the losers of the first round.

First-round games of the 2024 College World Series

• June 14: No. 4 North Carolina vs. No. 12 Virginia ( 2:00 p.m. ET, ESPN)
• June 14: No. 1 Tennessee vs. No. 8 Florida State (7:00 p.m. ET, ESPN)
• June 15: No. 2 Kentucky vs. No. 10 NC State (2:00 p.m. ET, ESPN)
• June 15: No. 3 Texas A&M vs. Florida (7:00 p.m. ET, ESPN)

How to watch the 2024 College World Series?

The games of the 2024 College World Series will air on ESPN. You can stream them through the ESPN+ app. You can download the app on iOS, Android and Amazon Fire TV devices among others. You can also stream ESPN on FuboTV, Hulu Live TV and DirecTV Stream.