INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. (UTLadyVols.com) – The Tennessee Lady Vol softball team (47-14) will host NCAA Regionals for the fourth consecutive campaign according to Sunday’s announcement of the NCAA Tournament bracket via ESPNU.

The Big Orange have been chosen as the No. 13 national seed and will welcome in three challenging squads to the Lee Softball Stadium in the form of Big South Tourney champion Winthrop (36-17), Louisville (30-21) of the BIG EAST Conference and Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament Champion Virginia Tech (44-15).

Time for each contest are still to be determined, but should be released sometime on Monday morning. Please check into utladyvols.com tomorrow for more information. Saturday match-up between Friday's two victors will be broadcast live at noon ET on ESPN2/ESPN360.com, despite which teams advance.

“We’re happy to be hosting what we consider to be a very difficult NCAA Regional at Sherri Parker Lee Stadium,” Lady Vol co-head coach Ralph Weekly said. “All three teams are quality opponents who have been here to Knoxville before, and who have given us tremendous battles during previous regionals. All three coaching staffs are very good and extremely experienced. This should be a very exciting regional for the fans. The name of the game is fast pitch, and we will see some of the premier pitchers in the country over the weekend. Our immediate goal is to figure out how to best compete with Winthrop on Friday. Karen (co-head coach) Weekly and I tell the players all the time that our hardest opponent is our best self. We need to prepare to play the best we can this weekend.”

If the Orange & White advance through to the NCAA Super Regionals, they would face-off against a squad from the Ann Arbor, Mich., regional in a best-of-three series for a berth in Oklahoma City. Fourth-seeded Michigan (48-6) will face Wright State (33-24) in its opening round contest while Notre Dame (37-20-1) battles Kent State (44-10) in the other half of their bracket.

This visit to the “Big Dance” marks the sixth overall NCAA Regional trip (27-12 overall NCAA record) for the Lady Vols. It is also UT’s fifth consecutive selection (2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008) to the field of 64 under the guidance of co-head coaches Ralph and Karen Weekly. Tennessee has made three straight trips to the Women’s College World Series in Oklahoma City, Okla., where the Lady Vols finished third nationally in both 2005 & 2006 and second overall in 2007.