Big Blue Brew 5/20: The Champs are HERE!

Diamond Cats Claim SEC Baseball Regular Season Crown

Author

Big Blue Brew Crew
May 20, 2024

🔵 The Official Daily Newsletter For Kentucky Athletics

Top of the Morning Wildcat Country. HOW BOUT THOSE CATS?!

No better way to start off the week than enjoying more hardware coming to Lexington, right? What a weekend for the Diamond Cats.

We’ll recap it all and much, much more in today’s Brew! Check it out below!

⚾️ The Champs are HERE!
🏀 Welcome To The Fam
🥎 Fought Til The End
🔵 And much, much more!

📈 STOCK UP

🔼 The Champs are HERE. That’s right, for the first time since 2006 and the second time in program history… the Cats are SEC Champs!

Going wire-to-wire, the Diamond Cats finished off a 22-8 conference slate over the weekend with a series win over Vanderbilt, taking the first two games 10-5 and 17-7 to claim the title.

The 22 SEC wins is a single-season program record.

🔼 Welcome To the Fam. The family just keeps growing.

On Friday, Coach Pope added his 11th addition to his inaugural roster in Lexington. Joining the Cats next season will be Ansley Almonor after a record-setting season at FDU.

Almonor set a Fairleigh Dickinson single-season record with 93 made 3-pointers as a junior last season, while averaging 16.4 points, 5.1 rebounds and 1.7 assists per game en route to earning first-team All-Northeast Conference honors. He will have one season of eligibility remaining.

Almonor is a 1,000-point collegiate scorer after spending his first three seasons with Fairleigh Dickinson. As a junior, he started in 31 of 32 games and connected on 43.6% of his field-goal attempts and 39.4% from 3-point range.

🔼 Big Week Ahead. It’s a big week in Lexington as the the best collegiate track and field athletes come to town to compete in the NCAA East First Round Prelims.

Among those athletes will be plenty of Cats, including Charity Hufnagel, who is enjoying a truly historic season for UK.

Charity joined the UK Sports Network this week to talk about her season and preview the week ahead.

🔼 Fought Til The End. The heart of the UK Softball program was on display on the biggest stage, battling some of the best teams in the country until the final out.

After winning a thriller in their regional opener, the Wildcats dropped a tough 6-3 decision to fifth-ranked Oklahoma State and were eliminated later Saturday night when Michigan pulled out a 4-2 win

UK finished with 31 wins on the year and ranked among the top-25 nationally.

🤔 BIG BLUE TRIVIA

In the three-game set against Vanderbilt, junior Emilien Pitre continued his torrid pace, reaching base safely in all three games to extend his current streak.

What does Pitre’s current on base streak sit at?

Got a guess? Check below for the answer!

🔵 ONE BIG THING

Leading The Way. So how, how did the Cats end up SEC Champs for the first time in 18 years?

It’s all about experience and leadership.

Dive deep into the Cats title-winning crew.

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📅 THE WEEK AHEAD 

Monday, May 20
🎾 Tennis at NCAA Singles/Doubles Championships (Stillwater, Okla.)

Tuesday, May 21
🎾 Tennis at NCAA Singles/Doubles Championships (Stillwater, Okla.)

Wednesday, May 22
🏐 Volleyball at Senri Kinran University @ TBA
⚾️ Baseball vs. Georgia/LSU @ 10:30am (SEC Tournament - Hoover, Ala.)
👟 Track and Field NCAA East First Rounds | Meet Info | Schedule | Live Results | Tickets

Thursday, May 23
🏐 Volleyball at Senri Kinran University @ TBA
⚾️ Baseball at SEC Tournament @ TBD (Hoover, Ala.)
👟 Track and Field NCAA East First Rounds | Meet Info | Schedule | Live Results | Tickets

Friday, May 24
👟 Track and Field NCAA East First Rounds | Meet Info | Schedule | Live Results | Tickets

Saturday, May 25
👟 Track and Field NCAA East First Rounds | Meet Info | Schedule | Live Results | Tickets

🎉 TRIVIA ANSWER

Answer: 28.

With his HR in Saturday’s series finale, Pitre’s streak reached 28 consecutive games on base.

🔵 Let’s get this week started!