Baseball team collects 5 ECAC awards

The Binghamton University baseball program won five awards in nation’s largest athletics conference after a 30-13 season.

The Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) named Binghamton head coach Tim Sinicki Coach of the Year and sophomore Nick Gallagher was named Pitcher of the Year. Freshman Justin Drpich, sophomore Justin Yurchak and junior Jacob Wloczewski were each named to the All-ECAC second team, joining Gallagher (first team).

The ECAC includes schools from eight Division I conferences (Atlantic-10, CAA, American, Ivy, Patriot, MAAC, NEC and America East). Binghamton tied Navy for the most selections.

Sinicki, also the America East Coach of the Year, led Binghamton to its sixth America East regular season title and one of the highest win-loss percentages in the nation (.698). His team won the most regular season games (30) in program history and achieved the highest national RPI (currently at No. 56 out of 299) in school history. A six-time conference coach of the year, Sinicki has 564 wins in his 25 years at Binghamton.

Gallagher earned the Pitcher of the Year “double” (also America East POY) after going 8-2 in the regular season with a 2.33 ERA. Opposing batters hit .203 off him, he went 14.2 straight innings without allowing an earned run at one point, and was among the nation’s ERA leaders in mid-May. Gallagher tied the school record for wins in a season and is the second Bearcats pitcher to earn ECAC POY honors, joining current Triple-A pitcher Murphy Smith (2009).

Drpich hit .404 in conference play to was also named to the America East first team.

Yurchak was 22nd in the country in on-base percentage (.474), and drew 41 walks (seventh in nation). He hit .333 in the regular season and was a first-team America East selection. He is eligible to be drafted in the upcoming Major League Baseball Amateur Draft June 12-14.

Wloczewski, another America East first team all-conference selection, won four games and had a 3.19 ERA in 2017. In conference play he was unbeaten (4-0) with a 2.31 ERA and was named to the all-conference tournament team.

The ECAC is nation’s largest and most expansive conference, since it began in 1940, ranging from Maine to Georgia to Missouri. Tearly 100 championships in men’s and women’s sports in 2015-16 and sponsors of over 5,800 varsity teams and 111,000 student-athletes.

Binghamton All-Time ECAC Division I All-Stars
2009 - Murphy Smith (Pitcher of Year)
2014 - Bill Bereszniewicz
2016 - Reed Gamache
2017 - Nick Gallagher (Pitcher of Year), Justin Drpich, Justin Yurchak, Jacob Wloczewski