I am a big fan of junior college baseball and will take every
opportunity to promote it. Generally,
it does not receive nearly as much attention as NCAA Division 1 baseball and
many people really are not aware of the great junior college baseball scene we
have in Texas. If you haven’t read my
article about my Top 5 Reasons to Play Junior College Baseball you can find it
at the link below.
5 Reasons to Play Junior College Baseball
The purpose of this article is to provide a broad picture of
junior college baseball in Texas so high school players and parents will have a
better understanding of:
- How many teams there are in Texas
- Where the teams are located
- Which conferences and regions the teams play
- How the NJCAA Championship Playoffs work
4. This article only discusses the NJCAA Division 1 schools in
Texas, there are also Division 2 and Division 3 teams which I will cover in future
articles.
In Texas there are two regions that teams compete in, Region
5 and Region 14. Both regions have two
conferences within each region. Region 5
is split into the Northern Texas Junior College Athletic Conference [NTJCAC]
and the Western Junior College Athletic Conference [WJCAC]. In Region 14 there is the South Zone Division
and the East Zone Division. Below is a table
listing all the teams in each region and conference. Clicking the team’s name will take you to
their website.
As you can see there are 30 junior college baseball teams
within these two regions and 27 of them are in Texas. To me these are 30 OPPORTUNITIES for a
high school player to start his college career!
The map below gives a visual on the locations of each team across
Texas. The link will take you to the map
in Google Maps.
NJCAA Region 5 and 14 Baseball Teams Map
The ultimate goal each year is to win the NJCAA Division 1 Baseball
World Series. This event is held every
year at Sam Suplizio Field in Grand Junction, Colorado and is always well attended. McLennan Community College won this year’s
championship in front of almost 11,000 fans!
To reach the World Series a team must win its District
Championship. There are 10 Districts in NJCAA
Division 1 and the winner of each District advances to the NJCAA Division 1
World Series. Below are the regions that
make up each district. The teams in
Texas from Region 14 represent the Mid-South District and those from Region 5
are in the Southwest District.
District Name Region(s)
Appalachian 7, 17
East 10, 15, 20
Mid-South 14
Midwest 4, 11, 24
Plains 6
South 22
South Atlantic 8
South Central 2, 16, 23
Southwest 5
West 1, 9, 18
Junior College baseball teams from Texas have done extremely
well at the NJCAA College World Series. Since
the tournament began in 1958, a team from Texas has won an amazing 21 times,
nearly one-third of the championships have been won by a Texas team. Clearly, if you are a player that wants to
compete for championships, attending a junior college in Texas offers that chance. Here is the full list of teams from Texas
that have won an NJCAA Baseball World Series title.
Team No. Titles Year(s)
San Jacinto College 5 1985, 1986, 1987, 1989, 1990
Grayson College (TX) 3 1999, 2000, 2008
Howard College (TX) 2 1991, 2009
McLennan Community College 2 1983, 2021
Ranger Junior College 2 1973, 1978
Galveston College 1 1994
Hillsborough Community College 1 1988
Navarro College 1 2011
North Central Texas College 1 2001
Northeast Texas Community College 1 1996
Panola College 1 1969
Paris Junior College 1 1959
Grand Total 21
If you are a player or parent of a player I hope this article has increased your knowledge and provided you with enough basic
information regarding Junior College baseball teams in Texas that you will include them as you research future playing opportunities.
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