LSU baseball coach Jay Johnson. (Associated Press Archives)

LSU won’t have to travel far from Alex Box Stadium for the NCAA Baseball Tournament.

The Tigers, who were in the mix to host a regional until going 1-2 in the SEC Tournament, got a break Monday when the selection committee sent them a mere two and a half hours away to Hattiesburg, Miss., where the Tigers will be the No. 2 seed.

LSU (38-10) will open play at 6 p.m. Friday against No. 3 seed Kennesaw State (35-26) on the Southern Miss campus.

Southern Miss (43-16), the No. 11 national seed, is the regional’s top seed and will play at 1 p.m. against No. 4 seed Army (31- 23).

The last three times LSU wasn’t a host site in the tournament, the Tigers were shipped to the West Coast. But this trip should be convenient for LSU players and fans alike.

“Once we knew we weren’t going to play in (Baton Rouge) and you start mapping out where everybody could drive to, it just made sense,” LSU coach Jay Johnson said. “I thought that if we were close in the hosting pecking order — which I believe we were — we would have a drivable distance game.”

Southern Miss’ Pete Taylor Park officially holds 4,300 but, with standing room, drew 6,346 for a game earlier this year against Ole Miss. The Golden Eagles packed in 5,658 when LSU last played there in 2008, which is still the fourth largest home crowd in USM history.

“Saddle up, let’s go,” Johnson said. “They (LSU fans) better be on the tickets already because I’m sure they’ll be hard to come by.”

Kennesaw State won the ASUN Conference Tournament after finishing third in the regular season.

Kennesaw State, which is located in the Atlanta suburb of the same name, played three games against SEC schools this season, losing 10-7 and 17-15 to Georgia and 14-1 to Auburn.

The winner of the Hattiesburg regional will be matched against the winner of the Miami regional for the super regional round. Miami is the No. 6 national seed. The other teams in Miami are Arizona, Ole Miss and Canisius.

LSU was one of four state schools getting a bid. Southland Conference Tournament champion Southeastern Louisiana will open at Auburn as the No. 4 seed against the hosts. UL-Lafayette will be in the Texas A&M regional as the No. 3 seed against No. 2 TCU. Louisiana Tech will be the No. 2 seed at Texas in Austin and play Dallas Baptist in its first game.

“That’s awesome,” Johnson said of the other Louisiana schools, all of whom won their conference tournaments. “It’s kind of a random coincidence, I played most of the state of Louisiana baseball programs when I was at Arizona. They came out to Tucson, and we had some really competitive games with them. I’m happy for them, and this is a good baseball state. We’ll be pulling for all of those teams to win their regionals.”