PROVIDENCE, R.I. – It was another good day for the Little East Conference regular season and tournament champion Keene State College baseball team on Wednesday when the league office released the 2025 major awards and all-conference selections, with the Owls taking home three of the four top awards and raking in two first-team selections, four second-team selections, and three third-team selections.

Junior Tommy Ahlers (Salem, N.H.) was named the LEC Player of the Year after posting an impressive .448 batting average and 1.198 OPS over 40 games, all starts.  He slashed an even more impressive .472/.542/.833 in the final 19 games, adding nine doubles, one triple, and 28 RBI to help spur KSC's blitz to a conference championship.  At one point, Ahlers recorded a hit in 24 consecutive games, including posting the 100th of his career, and finished with a whopping 22 multi-hit performances including 12 three-hit efforts and two games with four hits.  The Owl standout becomes the third LEC Player of the Year in program history, joining Jeremy Schilling (2006) and all-time program home run leader and KSC Hall of Famer Bobby Doyon (2010).

Little East tournament Most Outstanding Player Jake Jachym (Westfield, Mass.) also took home a major award, being named Pitcher of the Year in a vote of the conference's head coaches.  Also a junior, Jachym posted a 3.48 ERA in 64.2 innings of work this season, including a 6-1 record.  He struck out 30 and held opponents to a .249 average, walking just five on the season.  Jachym was especially strong in his last four outings, which included a relief effort in the LEC championship game, allowing just four earned runs in his last 25.1 innings with 15 strikeouts.  In the conference tournament, he limited RIC to just three runs in eight innings on a wet night at Franklin Pierce University to send the Owls to the final – including striking out the side in the eighth.  Then, in the championship, he induced a huge double play from Eastern Connecticut State University leadoff hitter Ray Leonzi in the seventh to end any budding threat and then tossed a 1-2-3 eighth to keep the Owls in front 2-1, after which they would go on to win by that score.  He is the fourth KSC pitcher to win the award in LEC history, joining Bill Williams (2000), 10th-round MLB draft pick Cody Dube (2016), and Michael Crimi (2017).
Owls head coach Justin Blood also took home the LEC Coach of the Year after helping KSC engineer a remarkable turnaround season, winning 17 of their final 19 games entering the NCAA tournament.  In early April, the Owls sat at 8-13 and 1-2 in the conference.  KSC would go on to sweep the University of Massachusetts-Boston on April 11, and have been on a mission since, winning their first Little East regular season championship since 2010 (and just the second outright title in program history) and then their first LEC tournament championship since 2008 when they held opponents to only six runs in four games.  Blood has helped Keene State improve on a year-by-year basis now in his fourth season, improving the Owls from six wins in his initial year, to 13 wins in 2023, to 21 wins in 2024, and now at least 25 victories to go along with LEC regular season and tournament championships this season.  It is the fifth time a KSC coach has taken home Coach of the Year honors, with former coach Ken Howe earning the recognition in 2000, 2005, 2007, and 2008.

In addition to their major award selections, Ahlers and Jachym were each named to the All-LEC First Team.  Evan Cali (.350 AVG, .951 OPS), Jonathan Chatfield (.322 AVG, 1.012 OPS, 9 HR), Evan McCue (.348 AVG, .903 OPS), and Ethan Rainha (.314 AVG, .760 OPS) earned Second Team recognition, while pitchers David Floyd, Camden Thomas, and Liam Conley were all Third Team selections.  Chatfield is currently in a fourth-place tie in home runs on KSC's all-time career list, while Floyd has whiffed 52 in 36 innings and Thomas a team-high 53 in 48.2 innings.  Floyd posted a 3.50 ERA, 5-2 record, one save, and .241 batting average against in 12 appearances (five starts), while Thomas had a 2.96 ERA, 5-2 record, and a .171 average against in 11 appearances (nine starts).

The Owls open their fifth NCAA appearance this Friday when they face No. 7 Salve Regina University at Penn State University-Harrisburg at 10:00 a.m.