Rice Tabbed For 2012 C-USA Baseball Title

Preseason All-Conference Team Named As Well… Conference USA announced its 2012 preseason baseball awards, as chosen by the league’s nine head coaches. UCF junior utility player D.J. Hicks was chosen as the preseason Player of the Year, while Rice sophomore left-hander Austin Kubitza was named the preseason Pitcher of the Year. Rice was chosen to win the league’s championship. The Owls have won either the regular season or tournament championship in each of its first six years as a member of C-USA. Hicks was a third team NCBWA All-American, a semifinalist for the Dick Howser Trophy and a second team All-Conference USA selection in 2011. As a redshirt sophomore last season, he led C-USA in RBI (66) and topped the Knights in batting (.351), placing fifth in the conference. Hicks ranked second in the conference in slugging percentage (.583), second on UCF in home runs (14) and walks (35), while adding 11 doubles and scoring 42 runs. He earned NCBWA National Hitter of the Week honors April 26 and had a pair of hitting streaks of 10 games or longer last season. Kubitza headlined an outstanding group of freshmen at Rice, earning the league’s Freshman of the Year honor last [...]

Source: http://collegebaseball360.com/2012/01/26/rice-tabbed-for-2012-c-usa-baseball-title/

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