Throughout the 2018-19 academic year, the Great Lakes Valley Conference is celebrating its 40th anniversary by recognizing 40 teams that made a significant impact both on campus and at the Conference level. Our next featured team is the 2000 Quincy baseball squad.
40 TEAMS | 40 YEARS
WEEK 37: 2000 Quincy Baseball
SEASON SUMMARY
The 2000 Quincy University baseball team followed up a 43-13 season and an NCAA Tournament berth in 1999 by capturing the school’s first-ever GLVC Championship in any sport. Under the direction of head coach Pat Atwell, the Hawks went 42-17 on the year, including a 17-4 record at home. With a 16-11 mark in league play, Quincy earned the No. 5 seed in the GLVC Tournament held at Indianapolis. The Hawks opened with a 7-1 victory over No. 4 Saint Joseph’s and edged top-seed Missouri-St. Louis 6-5 before falling to the host Greyhounds, 4-2. In the elimination bracket, Quincy knocked out No. 3 SIU Edwardsville 11-7, avenged its earlier loss to second-seeded UIndy by the same 4-2 score, and outlasted the Hounds in the championship final in a 13-12 victory. Josh Rabe (.363), Kyle Pryor (.343) and Greg Distler (.332) shined at the plate while starting in all 59 games for the Hawks. Rabe led Quincy with 14 home runs, Pryor boasted a team-high 63 runs batted in, while Distler came to the plate a team-best 226 times. Ben Piatt missed just two games on the season, but led Quincy with a .365 batting average and in extra base hits, including 25 doubles and four triples. On the mound, Ryan Birmingham paced the Hawks with a 3.00 earned run average with a 5-1 mark, while Josh Kinney registered a team-high nine wins (9-2) in 14 appearances. Rick Lawson led Quincy with 80.2 innings pitched, while Kraig Genenbacher fanned a team-best 46 batters. Despite almost equaling its season record from the 1999 campaign, the Hawks were left out of the NCAA Tournament as there were no automatic qualifying bids earned by the league champion at that time. The 2000 season also marked the end of Rabe’s collegiate career as he was drafted in the 11th round of the Major League Baseball draft by the Minnesota Twins. He would go on to reach the major leagues in July of 2006, hitting .286 and helping the team to the American League Central Division Title. Rabe was named an All-Star at each of his minor league stops and was named the Twins' Man of Steal Award in 2004 for leading the organization’s minor league affiliates in stolen bases.
IMPRESSIVE INDIVIDUALS
Josh Rabe
- Two-Time ABCA/Rawlings All-America (1999-2000)
- Two-Time ABCA/Rawlings All-Midwest Region (1999-2000)
- GLVC Player of the Year (1999)
- GLVC Freshman of the Year (1998)
- NCAA Division II Midwest Region Player of the Year (1999)
- Two-Time All-GLVC First Team (1999-2000)
- All-GLVC Second Team (1998)
- Selected in 11th Round of Major League Baseball Draft by the Minnesota Twins
- Inducted into GLVC Hall of Fame (2007)
Kyle Pryor
- Easton NCAA Division II Defensive Player of the Year (1999)
- All-GLVC Second Team (2000)
Ben Piatt
- Two-Time All-GLVC Second Team (2000-01)
Pat Atwell
- Two-Time GLVC Coach of the Year (1997-99)
- Led Quincy to 1997 and 1999 NCAA Tournament berths
- Guided Hawks to back-to-back 40-win seasons in 1999 and 2000
- Coached six All-Americans and two future major leaguers in Josh Rabe (Minnesota Twins) and Josh Kinney (St. Louis Cardinals)
- Finished coaching career at QU as the all-time wins leader with a 288-200-3 overall record
LASTING LEGACY
Quincy’s 2000 baseball team will forever be tied to the school’s first GLVC Championship, but it also serves as a memorable squad for three GLVC regulars. It would be Josh Rabe’s last Quincy team as a student-athlete, but he would return to campus to take over as head coach in the summer of 2010. In his first season with the Hawks, Rabe led the 2011 squad to the program's second-ever GLVC Championship title, finishing with a 35-20 overall record. Since returning to his alma mater, Rabe has guided the Hawks to the GLVC Championship Tournament in each of his nine seasons, making six championship game appearances and scoring back-to-back GLVC titles in 2017 and 2018. He has advanced the Hawks to seven NCAA Midwest Regionals, including the 2015 and 2016 events hosted on campus. Earlier this year, he surpassed his mentor Pat Atwell as the program’s all-time wins leader and then ended the 2019 campaign with 309 career wins. Three of those notable wins came in 2017 when he led the Hawks to the first NCAA Division II Championship appearance in school history. Despite dropping the third game of the regional, the Hawks team responded by winning three straight elimination games to advance to the NCAA Championship. He also owns the distinction of being the only person to ever win GLVC Freshman of the Year (1998), GLVC Player of the Year (1999), and GLVC Coach of the Year (2015). Atwell – the 1997 and 1999 GLVC Coach of the Year – would serve as skipper only one more year before moving into the role of Quincy athletics director. That vacancy opened with the departure of Jim Naumovich, who left to become GLVC Commissioner – a position he still holds today. Atwell served as Hawks AD from 2001-07 before leaving for the same position at fellow GLVC member Drury for the next seven years.