The road to the College World Series will go through the Southeastern Conference.

Widely regarded as college baseball’s best league the past few seasons, the SEC had an NCAA-record nine schools earn berths for the 64-team Division One tournament Monday.

“The SEC this year was far and above stronger than any conference,” Division One baseball committee chairman Charlie Carr said.

Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, LSU, Mississippi, Mississippi State, South Carolina, Tennessee and Vanderbilt all made it to the NCAA tournament — with a record five serving as hosts for the 16 four-team, double-elimination regionals that begin Friday.

The SEC also had the previous record of eight schools in the regionals, set in 2001 and matched last year.

Texas (50-13), which won the College World Series two years ago, was selected as the top national seed for the tournament.

“There are so many good teams out there that there wasn’t any one that was a slam dunk,” Carr said. “Texas is a great team, had a great run, had an unbelievable record and deserved to be No. 1.”

The other national seeds, in order, are: South Carolina (45-15), Miami (44-11), Georgia Tech (41-19), Stanford (44-12), Rice (43-12), Arizona State (40-16) and Arkansas (39-21). Those schools would face each other only if they make the College World Series.

“There is very little difference between No. 1 and No. 8,” said Carr, also the senior associate athletic director at Florida State.

The Longhorns are making their 47th tournament appearance and sixth in a row.

UT will take on Youngstown State (22-30) in their first game, and TCU and Oral Roberts will also play in the regional at Austin, Texas.

Rice is trying to join Texas (1949-50), Southern California (1970-74), Stanford (1987-88) and Louisiana State (1996-97) as repeat national champions.

The Owls play Texas Southern (18-33) in the first round of the Houston regional, which also includes Lamar and Texas A&M.

The Atlantic Coast Conference — with Clemson, Florida State, Georgia Tech, North Carolina, North Carolina State and Virginia — and the Big 12 — with Missouri, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas, Texas A&M and Texas Tech — had the second-most teams with six.

Miami, in its last year as an independent, is making its 32nd straight appearance to extend its NCAA record. The Hurricanes will begin play in the ACC next season.

Eight teams are making their first NCAA tournament appearances: Birmingham Southern, the College of Charleston, Jacksonville State, St. Bonaventure, Stony Brook, Texas Southern, UC Irvine and Youngstown State.

Western Kentucky and Vanderbilt received at-large bids to reach the regionals for the first time since 1980. George Mason will make its first tournament appearance since 1993.

Mississippi State was the only team to make it despite not making its conference tournament.