UNCW, which captured its sixth Colonial Athletic Association championship last weekend, takes on North Carolina, the 14th national seed, in the first game of the Chapel Hill Regional, which also includes Tennessee and Liberty. The Volunteers and Flames play at 7 p.m. on Friday.

The Seahawks, Tar Heels and Flames all earned automatic bids to the NCAA tournament while the Vols were an at-large selection out of the SEC. UNCW will be playing in a regional hosted by UNC for the third time. The Seahawks also played at Boshamer Stadium in 2006 and at the Team USA Training Complex in 2008 while Boshamer was under going renovations.

UNCW knocked off Elon, 6-5 in 10 innings, to earn the CAA automatic berth. Noah Liles doubled in Chris Thorburn with two outs in the top of the 10th to break a 5-all deadlock. The Phoenix forced extra innings with two runs in the bottom of the ninth.

Sophomore Greg Jones was named CAA tournament Most Outstanding Player and he joined Cole Weiss, Landen Roupp and Zarion Sharpe on the all-tournament team. The Seahawks became the first team seeded fifth to win the tournament title since they did so in 2006.

The Seahawks and Tar Heels played twice this season with UNC sweeping the home-and-home series with a 4-3 win at Boshamer and an 11-4 victory at Brooks Field. In 2018, UNCW had swept the Tar Heels.

The winner of game one will play Saturday at 4 p.m. while the loser faces elimination in an 11 a.m. start the same day.