Early Season Series Win Over UNC Shows What Stanford Baseball is Capable of in 2026

The North Carolina Tar Heels have won the ACC Tournament Championship. They had a phenomenal run, starting with a win over Boston College, where a late surge sealed the deal. The following day, they took down Florida State, a likely national seed come tournament time.

It was a phenomenal victory, as the Seminoles were regarded by some as the best team in the ACC. To follow up, North Carolina dominated Clemson in the championship to take home another ACC Championship trophy.

UNC has quite the team this year, and will be one of the host teams for the upcoming Regionals. The site assignments and regional pairings will be announced at 9 a.m. on Monday. But one kryptonite that they had was early in the season, was when the Stanford Cardinal dominated them in Chapel Hill.

Stanford had a solid, yet inconsistent season. The Cardinal finished 27-25, but had trouble making the Pac 12 to ACC switch, finishing just 11-19 in conference play. Their season ended on day one of the conference tournament, where the No. 13 seeded Cardinal lost to the No. 12 seeded Virginia Tech.

However, their season highlight was a series victory against North Carolina back in March. The Cardinal made a statement in game one, despite a slow start. The Tar Heels led 3-0 in the first, but Stanford dominated 13-6 from there on out, taking the first game, 13-9.

Game two was different though, as the Tar Heels dominated game two, winning 11-1. They run-ruled the Cardinal, with the game lasting just seven innings. All hope seemed lost for Stanford, but they bounced back in game three, and won 7-0, taking home the series. It was clearly the highlight of the entire season.

Although Stanford’s season didn’t end as planned, North Carolina’s turned out to be incredible. The Tar Heels are currently one of if not the best team in the country, and will be a likely College World Series participant.

And yet, Stanford went into Chapel Hill and took care of business when they were performing well early in the season. It was that series win that produced a decent amount of hope for the Cardinal faithful that they would be able to return to the College World Series this summer.

While that didn't end up being the case, it did show the potential that this club has moving forward into the 2026 campaign. With young guys like Tatum Marsh ad Rintaro Sasaki, this club looks to have a couple of big building blocks for the program. If Stanford is able to build around them, 2026 could be when they turn things around.