RUSSELLVILLE, Ark. – Junior first baseman
Dan Pruitt was named Great American Conference Player of the Year while a total of six Oklahoma Baptist players made the 2022 All-GAC Baseball Team, as the league announced its postseason honors on Friday.
Pruitt became just the third Bison to win Player of the Year accolades and first since Jake Gozzo was named Defensive Player of the Year in 2019. On top of that honor, Pruitt was a unanimous first-team selection and made the All-Defensive Team.
OBU ended up placing five on the All-GAC First Team list, the most of any school in the league.
Bo Dallas,
Isiah Lissade,
Walker Keller and
Kade Self were the others. The five selections to the top team were also the most in program history, besting the 2017 and 2019 squads which placed four.
For Pruitt, he was sensational in the batter's box. At the conclusion of the regular season, the Oklahoma City native led the GAC in five categories: slugging (.909), runs scored (67), home runs (22), RBI (66) and triples (5). Defensively, he had 353 chances, notched 332 putouts and committed just a single error for a .997 fielding percentage.
One of Pruitt's best games came during the April 29 contest against SNU when he tied OBU D2 single-game records in hits (5) and homers (3).
Lissade, who has played the majority of the season in left field, ranked in the top five of the GAC in several categories: runs scored (56), hits (67), home runs (16) and total bases (126). He also notched 21 multi-hit games. In 12 separate games, OBU's lead-off guy attained three hits. Lissade also registered a 12-for-14 stolen base mark.
Self, one of OBU's designated hitters, was a major threat for the green and gold. The Shawnee native was tied for second in the GAC in batting average (.400), third in slugging (.800) and checked in at tenth with 13 homers. His best game came against East Central on March 13 when he notched a pair of home runs and tied the OBU single-game RBI record with eight.
In centerfield was Keller. The senior from Murrieta, California, who was a second-team selection last season, batted .318, notched 57 hits, 14 doubles, seven home runs, 29 RBI and tallied 17 stolen bases which ranked fourth in the GAC. Keller registered 18 multi-hit games as well.
OBU's last first-team selection was Dallas. He was fourth in ERA (3.46), seventh with 74 strikeouts and third with 80.2 innings pitched. One of the senior's best performances came in a 12-3 win over No. 9 Southern Arkansas on April 15. In that contest, he struck out a season-high 12 batters.
The last all-conference selection for the Bison was catcher
Alex Schroeder who garnered second-team recognition. The Rocklin, California native checked in at fourth in slugging (.762), second in home runs (21) and RBI (63), and was the GAC leader with six sacrifice flies. Defensively, he gave up the second fewest stolen bases (23) in the conference too.
