JOPLIN, Mo. – Missouri Southern baseball earned the 2025-26 American Baseball Coaches Association Team Academic Excellence Award, the organization announced Wednesday. The Lions registered a 3.30 GPA during the 2025-26 academic year.
More than 800 member high school and college programs nationwide were recognized with the 2025-26 ABCA Team Academic Excellence Award. The award honors ABCA member programs that posted a cumulative team GPA of 3.0 or higher on a 4.0 scale during the 2025-26 academic year.
This year's award recipients include nearly 500 college programs and more than 320 high school programs.
Following the conclusion of the spring semester, coaches were invited to nominate their teams for the award before the July 17 deadline.
To qualify, a program was required to meet the following criteria:
- Be a high school or college baseball program
- Have a head coach who is a current ABCA member
- Post a minimum cumulative team GPA of 3.0 on a 4.0 scale for the 2025-26 academic year
The American Baseball Coaches Association has a long tradition of recognizing the achievements of baseball coaches and student-athletes. The ABCA/Rawlings All-America Teams are the nation's oldest, founded in 1949, and the ABCA's awards program also includes the ABCA/Rawlings All-Region Awards, the ABCA/ATEC Regional & National Coaches of the Year and several other major awards such as the ABCA Hall of Fame and the Dave Keilitz Ethics in Coaching Award.
