BAY CITY, Mich. - The 2011 All-Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (GLIAC) Baseball teams and postseason awards were announced in conjunction with the opening round of the Conference Tournament held in Chillicothe, Ohio at V.A. Memorial Stadium.

Grand Valley State University junior outfielder Cody Grice (DeWitt, Mich.) was named the 2011 Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (GLIAC) baseball “Player of the Year” by the league’s head coaches in all-conference balloting. Ashland University senior Ajay Meyer (East Halmer, Ohio/Owens C.C.) was named the 2011 GLIAC baseball “Pitcher of the Year.”

The coaches named Grand Valley State rookie Bill Maple (Kalamazoo, Mich./Vicksburg) the conference’s “Freshman of the Year,” while Steve Lyon, head coach of Grand Valley State’s  baseball team, was tabbed the “Coach of the Year.”

Click here for a printer-friendly (PDF) version of this release

 

Grice is the fifth Laker to win “GLIAC Player of the Year” in school history and the first since 2001. Grice is hitting .389 this season with 50 runs, four home runs and 50 runs-batted-in. He has a .590 slugging percentage and a .490 on-base percentage, both top five marks in the GLIAC. He ranks second in the league in runs, RBI, and hit by pitches with 12, the fourth highest single-season total in school history. Grice ranks in the top eight in the conference in batting average, slugging percentage, on-base percentage, runs, hits (56), RBI, doubles (11), triples (3), home runs (4), total bases (85), walks (28), hit by pitch, sacrifice flies (12) and stolen bases (18).

 

 

 

Meyer has put together one of the best pitching seasons in recent AU memory. He was 9-3 with a 1.47 ERA in the regular season and set the school single-season record for complete games with 11. Meyer is the GLIAC leader in strikeouts (94) and innings pitched (92.0) and is tied for the league lead with nine wins. He made 15 appearances and also had two saves this season to go along with three complete game shutouts. The Hamler, Ohio native went the distance in all but one of his starts. In nine of his appearances he allowed no earned runs. Opponents are batting just .187 off him this season and he has walked just 13 batters. On May 7, he threw the first one-hitter of his career against visiting Hillsdale. For his career, Meyer is 19-5 with 19 complete games.

 

 

 

Maple was named the GLIAC “Freshman of the Year” after tallying a 7-0 record with a 1.95 ERA and 37 strikeouts in 37 innings pitched. His seven wins are the most in school history for a freshman. Maple led the team with a .161 opponent’s batting average and never yielded more than four hits in any start this season. He had a team-high 10 strikeouts against Tiffin on April 16th (6 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 BB), the only time this season a Laker recorded double-digit strikeouts. Maple went the first 22.1 innings of the season without allowing an earned run and has only allowed three extra base hits all season long. He’s the fourth Laker in school history to win the honor.

 

 

 

 

Lyon, earns the GLIAC Coach of the Year, for the second time in his career (2003). Lyon has guided the Lakers to the top winning percentage in NCAA Division II this season and the Lakers finished the regular season with the best GLIAC record in conference history. The team’s 45 wins are the most in school history in the regular season while the three losses are the least in school history in the regular season. Lyon notched his 500th career victory as the head coach of the Lakers on May 7th with a 4-3 win over Ohio Dominican, with a career record now standing at 502-187-2 (.728) as the Lakers’ head coach. He has helped construct the longest winning streak in school history, with the Lakers having won 25 straight games, besting the 2006 squad that had a 21-game winning streak. The Lakers won the 15th GLIAC title in school history this year, the eighth in the last nine years and the eighth in Lyon’s career.

 

 

 

GLIAC Baseball All-Conference First Team
Pos.	Name	School	Year	B/T	Hometown/Previous School
DH	Cory Phillips	Grand Valley State	Sr.	R/R	Normal, Ill./Heartland C.C.
C	Michael Wiseman	Wayne State	Sr.	L/R	White Lake, Mich./Lakeland
1B	Pat Curtin	Tiffin	Jr.	R/L	Mason, Ohio/Moeller
2B	Garrett Yatch	Grand Valley State	Jr.	L/R	Midland, Mich./Kellogg C.C.
SS	Ryan Rua	Lake Erie	Jr.	R/R	Amherst, Ohio/Steele
3B	Tyler Gray	Ashland	Fr.	R/R	Plain City, Ohio/Jonathan Alder
INF	Matt McAllester	Ashland	Sr.	L/R	Westlake, Ohio
OF	Steve Anderson	Grand Valley State	Jr.	R/R	Northville, Mich.
OF	Cody Grice	Grand Valley State	Jr.	R/R	DeWitt, Mich.
OF	Brandon James	Lake Erie	Sr.	R/R	Mentor, Ohio
OF	Evan Melendez	Ashland	Sr.	L/L	Amherst, Ohio/Steele
SP	Carson Beauchaine	Saginaw Valley State	So.	R/R	Fraser, Mich.
SP	Ryan Garman	Grand Valley State	Jr.	R/R	Cedar Rapids, Iowa/Johnson County C.C.
SP	Ajay Meyer	Ashland	Sr.	R/R	East Halmer, Ohio/Owens C.C.
SP	Kyle Schepel	Grand Valley State	Jr.	L/R	Grand Rapids, Mich/Christian
RP	Brad Zambrong	Grand Valley State	So.	L/L	Waterford, Mich./Brother Rice
GLIAC Baseball All-Conference Second Team
Pos.	Name	School	Year	B/T	Hometown/Previous School
DH	Matt Pochmara	Hillsdale	Fr.	R/R	Farmington, Mich.
C	JT Feldkamp	Ohio Dominican	Sr.	R/R	Lorain, Ohio/Admiral King
1B	Giancarlo Brugnoni	Grand Valley State	Fr.	R/R	Grosse Pointe, Mich./De La Salle
2B	Felix Brown	Ohio Dominican	Sr.	S/R	Philipsburg, St. Maarten/Milton Peters
SS	Andrew Trepel	Grand Valley State	Sr.	R/R	Joliet Ill./Indiana State
3B	Jordan Chiero	Tiffin	Jr.	R/R	Gahanna, Ohio/New Albany
INF	Adam Connell	Hillsdale	Sr.	R/R	Chelsea, Mich.
OF	C.J. Maszal	Wayne State	Jr.	R/R	Allen Park, Mich./Ohio University
OF	Kyle O’Boyle	Saginaw Valley State	So.	R/R	Midland, Mich./Bullock Creek
OF	Matt Toth	Lake Erie	Jr.	L/R	Lorain, Ohio/Admiral King
OF	Paul Young	Grand Valley State	Sr.	L/R	London, Ont./Grand Rapids C.C.
SP	Mark Heard	Northwood	Jr.	R/R	Novi, Mich.
SP	Aaron Hilt	Ashland	Jr.	R/R	Richmond, Ohio/Edison
SP	Brett Shankin	Wayne State	Sr.	L/R	Washington, Mich./Romeo
SP	Josh Wedesky	Wayne State	Jr.	R/R	Fowlerville, Mich.
RP	Billy Hurley	Wayne State	Jr.	R/R	Mississauga, Ont./Binghamton
GLIAC Baseball All-Conference Honorable Mention
Pos.	Name	School	Year	B/T	Hometown/Previous School
1B	Austin Erb	Ashland	So.	L/L	Strasburg, Ohio/Hanover
RP	Andrew Pinkelman	Ashland	Jr.	L/R	Delta, Ohio/Evergreen
OF	Jason Reitenbach	Findlay	Sr.	R/R	Brunswick, Ohio/Youngstown State
INF	Tommy Roush	Findlay	So.	L/R	Kettering, Ohio/Fairmont
C	Jared Cowan	Grand Valley State	Jr.	R/R	Davison, Mich.
C	Zach Laupp	Grand Valley State	Jr.	R/R	Mattawan, Mich.
SP	Brent Opland	Hillsdale	Sr.	L/L	Dexter, Mich.
C	Chris Stephens	Hillsdale	Jr.	R/R	Grosse Pointe, Mich./Farmington
RP	Doug Fox	Lake Erie	So.	L/L	Parma, Ohio/Valley Forge
1B	Jae Leeworthy	Lake Erie	Jr.	R/R	Newton Falls, Ohio
2B	Michael Goodwin	Northwood	Sr.	R/R	Midland, Mich./Saginaw Valley State
C	Ryan Palmer	Northwood	Jr.	R/R	Saginaw, Mich./Nouvel
OF	Germaine McAlpine	Ohio Dominican	Sr.	L/L	Canton, Ohio/McKinley
SS	Tyler Zaidel	Ohio Dominican	Jr.	R/R	Cincinnati, Ohio/Bishop Fenwick
OF	Ryan Ermers	Saginaw Valley State	Jr.	R/R	Sterling Heights, Mich./Henry Ford
SS	Matt Hunt	Saginaw Valley State	Jr.	R/R	Howell, Mich./Concordia University
OF	Michael Dushane	Tiffin	Jr.	R/R	Blissfield, Mich./Defiance
SS	Val Helldobler	Tiffin	Jr.	R/R	Toledo, Ohio/St. John Jesuit
SS	Caleb Dalman	Wayne State	Sr.	R/R	Hudsonville, Mich.
SP	Alex Pierse	Wayne State	So.	L/L	Clinton Twp., Mich./De La Salle