The Missouri Valley Conference has announced that baseball, softball and tennis tournament formats will return to their standard "pre-COVID" team participation numbers.

Based significantly on cancelation of the Spring 2020 season (which would have resulted in multiple seasons impacted for baseball, softball and tennis) and the lack of NCAA blanket relief for seasons of competition in spring sports, athletics administrators voted to return to standard tournament formats for those three league-sponsored sports.  For baseball, that means an eight-team championship, featuring single elimination for seeds 5-8, followed by a six-team double elimination format.  For softball, the league will have a 10-team modified single-elimination bracket, and for women’s tennis a seven-team single-elimination bracket will be employed.

Women's tennis, which did not conduct its traditional fall invitational in 2020, will conduct its team championship in Springfield, Mo., April 23-25.  Missouri State is the host institution.  Women's tennis teams in the MVC include Bradley, Drake, Illinois State, Missouri State, UNI, Stony Brook, and Valparaiso.

The softball championship is being hosted by Evansville on Wednesday-Saturday, May 12-15, with all nine games being distributed on ESPN+ through the ESPN App.  All 10 MVC schools sponsor softball.

Southern Illinois will host the baseball championship on Tuesday-Saturday, May 25-29 in Carbondale, with each contest being shown on ESPN+ via the ESPN App.  MVC baseball members include Bradley, DBU, Evansville, Illinois State, Indiana State, Missouri State, Southern Illinois, and Valparaiso.