By Scott Barancik, Editor
That was quick.
College baseball’s regular season ended May 16. Up next on Division 1 schedules are conference tournaments, followed by the NCAA’s 64-team tournament and College World Series.
So, how did our Jewish collegians do during the regular season? Below are some highlights.
One housekeeping note. Division I baseball conferences vary widely in strength and competitiveness. How widely? Comparing a conference at the top of the list to one at the bottom can be a little like comparing MLB to the low minors. So in order to give you a sense of the competitiveness that each collegian faces, we have ranked the conferences from 1 to 31, from most to least competitive. (Or, more accurately, we used Gemini to help create the rankings; they were current as of April 24. Click here to see the methodology.)
As you’ll see below, a player’s college is now followed by its NCAA conference and that conference’s competitiveness rank. Georgia Tech, for example, is part of the ACC, which Gemini ranks #2 among Division 1 conferences. The school therefore is identified as Georgia Tech (ACC #2).
Now, let’s play ball!
Honors and Awards
RHP Dylan Banner, a 6-foot-5-inch senior at the University at Albany (America East #22), was named the conference’s 2026 Pitcher of the Year on May 19. Banner ranked #1 in strikeout-to-walk ratio (3.19), #1 in fielding independent pitching (4.07), #2 in ERA (3.94), #2 in walk percentage (5.4%), #3 in strikeout percentage (17.2%), #3 in WHIP (1.31), and #4 in opponent batting average (.255). Banner is the first Albany player to win the award (5/20/2026)
The Big East Conference named C/1B Adam Agresti, a junior at St. John’s University (Big East #16), to its 2026 First Team All-Big East roster on May 19. He finished his breakout regular season tied for #2 in the Big East with 17 HRs. He also ranked #4 with 47 RBIs, #8 with a .423 OBP, and #3 with a 1.055 OPS. His brother, C/LF Jason Agresti, plays for the New York Boulders of the independent Frontier League (5/20/2026)
On May 18, the highly competitive Atlantic Coast Conference named 3B Ryan Zuckerman, a junior transfer at Georgia Tech (ACC #2), to its 2026 First-Team All-ACC roster. The 6-foot-4-inch Pennsylvania native finished the regular season hitting .335 (67-for-200) with 20 HRs (#3 in ACC), 70 RBIs (#2), slugging of .720 (#4), and OPS of 1.153 (#5). Zuckerman previously played at the University of Pittsburgh, a fellow ACC school (5/20/2026)
Preseason expectations for OF Harrison Feinberg, a redshirt senior at Northeastern University (Coastal Athletic Association #9), were high this year. The CAA named him its 2026 Preseason Player of the Year. USA Baseball included Feinberg in its 2026 Golden Spikes Award Preseason Watch List, an award sometimes compared to college football’s Heisman Trophy. D1Baseball named Feinberg a 2026 Preseason All-American, Second Team. So how did his season go? Pretty darn good. For example, Feinberg homered three times in an April 12 win over the University of Maine. The next day, he hit the 43rd home run of his college career, a 423-foot bomb that broke Northeastern’s career record. And in early May, he stole his 38th base, setting a new single-season record at Northeastern. At the end of the 2026 regular season, Feinberg ranked among CAA leaders with 42 stolen bases (#1), 61 RBIs (#2), 15 HRs (#3), OPS of 1.065 (#3), and slugging of .617 (#4). It’s unclear whether he will be selected in July’s MLB draft, but D1Baseball‘s preseason projection ranked him as the CAA’s #2 draft prospect (5/20/2026)
Sam Grunberg, a senior infielder at Jacksonville University (ASUN #14), was named ASUN Player of the Week for April 13-19 after hitting .550 (11-for-20) with 7 RBIs to help lead Jacksonville to four straight wins. Grunberg’s finest moments came in an April 14 game against the University of Central Florida. His 8th-inning home run tied the score at 3-3, and his RBI single in the 10th put the Dolphins ahead 4-3 en route to a 5-4, 11-inning victory (5/20/2026)
LHP Zac Laviage, a sophomore transfer at Texas Southern University (SWAC #29), a historically Black school, was named the Southwestern Athletic Conference’s Newcomer of the Week on April 23 after pitching 7 scoreless innings in an eventual 5-4 loss to Arkansas-Pine Bluff (5/20/2026)
If you know of other Division 1 players who have earned honors or awards in 2026, please email us at editor@jewishbaseballnews.com.
MLB Draft Prospect
The remarkable season of C Max Kaufer ended prematurely. A senior transfer at Wichita State (AAC #8), Kaufer was hitting .440 (22-for-50) with a jaw-dropping 11 HRs, 27 RBIs, and 1.747 OPS when he injured his shoulder in a March 17 loss to Nebraska. The former Texas A&M and University of South Carolina catcher subsequently underwent season-ending surgery. Despite recording just 50 ABs, Kaufer tied for #7 in the AAC’s end-of-season home-run rankings, with those ahead of him getting anywhere from 172 to 239 ABs. Despite the injury, on April 29, Baseball America ranked Kaufer #371 among its Top 400 Prospects for the 2026 MLB Draft (5/20/2026)
Fresh Starts
LHP Austin Weiss, a freshman at the University of Maryland (Big Ten #4), had quite an introduction to college ball. The first batter he faced in his March 22 debut was UCLA’s Roch Cholowsky, the projected #1 pick in the 2026 MLB Draft. Weiss struck him out on a 2-2 count and ended up tossing a scoreless inning against the country’s top-ranked college team, yielding no hits and two walks while striking out two (5/20/2026)
C Gavin Taylor, a junior transfer who spent 2025 at a community college, displayed elite raw power at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas (MWC #13) in 2026. Thirteen of the Los Angeles native’s 18 hits went for extra bases, and he homered once every 10.75 ABs. All that power came at a cost—namely, a .209 batting average and 31.82% strikeout rate. But Taylor’s walk rate was a healthy 14.55%, and his unusually low .222 BABIP suggests some of the low average may have reflected bad luck, limited foot speed, or both—not only poor contact (5/20/2026)
In the News
OF Ethan Hott, a senior at Stanford University (ACC #2), was profiled May 11 by the Jewish News of Greater Phoenix and Northern Arizona. Hott, who hit .313 (20-for-64) with one HR, 13 RBIs, a .418 OBP, and .871 OPS, said he wants to play for Team Israel and hasn’t taken off his Star of David since freshman year (5/20/2026)
D1Baseball published an article in April about C Elie Kligman, a graduate student at the University of Michigan now playing for his fourth college team. The article explores the challenges of playing Division 1 baseball as an Orthodox Jew, including having to miss about two of every five games. “I’ll take the trade-off of Elie’s time limitations just to have him in our locker room,” said Michigan coach Tracy Smith. “He means that much to the team” (5/20/2026)
Retired CF Kevin Pillar’s career trajectory should be an inspiration for anyone playing Division 2 ball. Pillar spent three stellar years at California State University-Dominguez Hills (Division 2) before being picked by the Blue Jays in the 32nd round of the 2011 MLB Draft. In a recent interview, Pillar discussed feeling intimidated at first by Division 1 players and then going on to outperform them. RHP Bubby Rossman is among eight other Cal State Dominguez Hills baseball alumni who reached the Majors (5/20/2026)
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