GRINNELL, Iowa – The Midwest Conference announced the 2023 All-Conference baseball selections on Tuesday, with five Ripon players garnering recognition.
Brock Warren and MWC Newcomer of the Year
Kyler Hickman landed on the First Team, while
Mitchell Lukasik,
Nick Tenny and
Brock Turkington each were voted to the Second Team.
Hickman made an immediate in his first year with the Red Hawks, hitting .376 on the year and a blistering .456 in league action. A freshman from Tracy, Calif., Hickman led the team in hits (56), RBI (46) and total bases (96), and his 10 home runs tied him for third on the Midwest leaderboard.
Hickman finished his first collegiate season with 18 multi-hit games and at one point had reached base in 28 consecutive games, the best mark of any Ripon hitter. Three days after his first multi-homer game, Hickman turned in a season-best four-hit day against Lawrence, scoring three runs to help Ripon to a convincing MWC win on the road.
The only Ripon hitter with a higher season batting average was two-way star
Brock Warren, who clipped .418 with 34 RBI and 23 stolen bases in 25 attempts, good enough for second all-time. The sophomore also started 11 games on the mound, striking out 47 opposing hitters in 62.2 innings of work, leading the team in each of the three categories.
A senior outfielder, Tenny turned in an impressive .381 clip in MWC games, driving in 12 runs while staying perfect in stolen base attempts. Tenny was red-hot for a weekend series against Grinnell to open the month of May, picking up seven hits while scoring six runs and plating four more over the course of a three-game series.
Lukasik, a sophomore, was one of the most consistent arms in the MWC all season long, turning in a perfect 6-0 record and delivering a pair of complete games against league opponents. The right hander turned in five outings with one or less earned run, and his best performance of the year came against Chicago on April 21, when he racked up seven strikeouts and went the distance to get the win.
Turkington led the Red Hawks with 19 appearances out of the bullpen, and he delivered by recording a 1.48 earned run average and limiting opposing hitters to a batting average of just .231. On 15 occasions, the senior turned in a scoreless outing, and his season-high five strikeouts came against Illinois College on April 2.
The Red Hawks won three straight elimination games in the Midwest Conference Tournament before falling in the championship game against top-seed Beloit by a final of 4-1. Ripon ended the year at 25-18, marking the program's highest win total in more than a decade.
