Texas Tech baseball head coach Tim Tadlock has been named 2018 American Baseball Coaches Association (ABCA)/Diamond Midwest Regional Coach of the Year, it was announced today.
It’s the second time Tadlock has earned the accolade, last doing so after the program’s first trip to the College World Series in 2014. The 2018 award comes on the heels of Tech’s third trip to the CWS in five years.
Tadlock, who just completed his sixth season at the helm of the Red Raider baseball program, guided Tech to a 45-20 overall record in 2018, with a 15-9 mark in Big 12 games and a 6-3 slate in the NCAA Tournament. It was the second-straight year and fourth in five seasons Tech has won at least 45 games.
The Red Raiders opened the season at 14-0, the best record to start a season in school history. Included in that stretch was Tadlock’s 200th victory as head coach of Texas Tech, coming in a 5-0 shutout of UTSA on Feb. 24. His overall record now sits at 239-132 over his six years in Lubbock.
The 2018 squad scored the school’s most runs (529) & hit the most homers (82) since 2004, recorded its highest hit total since 2001 (695), had the most RBI (492) since 1997 and put together its best batting average (.309) since 2006. The Red Raiders also struck out 565 opponents, the most since a school record 589 in 1997, and tallied five shutouts for the second time in three years.
Five Red Raiders picked up First Team All-Big 12 awards in Gabe Holt, Josh Jung, Caleb Kilian, Grant Little and Zach Rheams, while Holt was named Big 12 Freshman of the Year. Little was named a unanimous All-American, earning honors from six different publications, as Jung (five), Rheams (one) and Holt (one) also racked up All-America accolades. Holt also was recognized with four freshman All-America nods. The Red Raiders also had 11 placed on the Academic All-Big 12 squads.
Eleven Tech student-athletes were selected in the 2018 Major League Baseball Draft, the most in program history. Grant Little (74th – San Diego Padres), Steven Gingery (123rd – St. Louis Cardinals), Ryan Shetter (262nd – Atlanta Braves), Jose Quezada (291st – San Diego Padres), Davis Martin (408th – Chicago White Sox), Ty Harpenau (472nd – Atlanta Braves), Caleb Kilian (595th – Baltimore Orioles), Cody Farhat (703rd – Cleveland Indians), Michael Davis (724th – Minnesota Twins), Dylan Dusek (796th – San Francisco Giants) and Zach Rheams (800th – New York Mets) were all taken in this year’s class, which had the most of any D-I program through the first 30 rounds of the draft.
The regional award for Tadlock makes him one of the eight nominees for the ABCA/Diamond National Coach of the Year award, which will be announced on July 3. Tadlock and the other seven regional honorees will be honored on Friday, Jan. 4, on the main stage of the clinic hall prior to the start of clinics at the 75th annual ABCA Convention, which will be held on Jan. 3-6, 2019, in Dallas, Texas.
The ABCA, founded in 1945, is the primary professional organization for baseball coaches at the amateur level. Its nearly 10,000 members represent all 50 states and 23 countries. Since its initial meeting of 27 college baseball coaches in June 1945, the association’s annual awards program has grown to include nine divisions: NCAA Division I, II and III, NAIA, NJCAA Division I, II, III Pacific Association Division and High School.
COURTESY OF TEXAS TECH ATHLETICS
