NCEA Championship Central

WACO, Texas - Coming off a 2015 Big 12 Equestrian Championship, the Baylor Bears are seeded No. 2 in Thursday-Saturday's NCEA Championship and will compete in the quarterfinals Friday after earning a first-round bye at the Extraco Center in Waco.

The Bears (13-4) are looking for their first NCEA championship since Baylor won the hunt seat title in 2012. Beginning in 2014, the NCEA began awarding an overall champion rather than awarding titles to hunt seat, western and overall.

Baylor will await the winner of No. 7-seed TCU and No. 10-seed Oklahoma State for a Friday 8:30 quarterfinals matchup of Big 12 teams. Baylor won all three matchups with TCU this season and split with Oklahoma State.

The NCEA invites 12 teams to the field at the event hosted by the City of Waco, the Extraco Center and Baylor University. Although the Extraco Center is just a few miles away from Baylor's campus, the Bears will not be competing in their home facility, the Willis Family Equestrian Center.

Thursday's events will feature first-round matchups between: No. 8 SMU vs. No. 9 Kansas State, No. 5 Auburn, vs. No. 12 UT Martin, No. 6 Fresno State vs. No. 11 New Mexico State and No. 7 TCU vs. No. 10 Oklahoma State.

No. 1 Georgia, No. 2 Baylor, No. 3 South Carolina and No. 4 Texas A&M all await winners of the first-round to begin the quarterfinals Friday.

In each of the first two rounds of competition, reining and flat are scheduled to begin at 8:30 a.m. with fences and horsemanship slated to begin at 2 p.m.

With four teams remaining Saturday, the semifinals and championship will take place in the same day with the semis beginning with reining and flat at 8:30 a.m. with fences and horsemanship at 11 a.m. The finals are scheduled to begin at 1:30 p.m. with flat, 2:30 p.m. with horsemanship, 3:15 p.m. with fences and 4:15 p.m. with reining.

Admission to all days is free to the public. Fans who can't make it to Waco for the NCEA Championship can follow online at tournament central, which includes results and live-stream links: http://www.baylorbears.com/ot/15NCEAChamps.html.

Baylor fans can follow the official twitter and facebook accounts @BaylorEQ, and the instagram account @baylorequestrian for updates.