Tulane’s baseball program has once again been honored with the American Baseball Coaches Association’s Team Academic Excellence Award, marking the tenth straight year the Green Wave have earned the distinction.
The award, which recognizes programs that maintain a collective GPA of at least 3.0 throughout the 2025‑26 academic year, placed Tulane among just eleven institutions nationwide to achieve the feat each of the past decade, while nearly five hundred college programs and three hundred twenty high schools were celebrated for their scholarly commitments.
On the field, the 2026 campaign concluded with a 25‑31 overall record and a 10‑17 mark in conference play, yet the season was punctuated by standout performances, including an All‑Conference nod for Jason Wachs and a suite of academic accolades.
The academic accolades extended to five teammates — Jason Wachs, Trey Cehajic, Trent Liolios, Jake Toporek, Blaise Wilcenski, Tyler Hoffman and Michael Johns — who earned College Sports Communicators Academic All‑District honors, underscoring the program’s balance of athletics and scholarship.
Among those achievements, pitcher Sam Larson was drafted by the Colorado Rockies in the sixteenth round of the 2026 MLB Draft, continuing a streak that has seen a Wave pitcher selected in six consecutive drafts and bringing the total number of Tulane players chosen by the franchise to three.
A Legacy of Excellence
Over the past three seasons, eight players from the Green Wave have been drafted, and Larson’s selection marks the thirteenth‑nine‑teenth player in program history to be chosen, reflecting a pipeline that consistently feeds talent to Major League Baseball. The Green Wave’s sustained presence in the ABCA’s academic honors, coupled with a draft pipeline that has produced eight selections in the last three years, illustrates a program where scholarly ambition and competitive drive are cultivated in tandem, ensuring that excellence is a tradition as much as a goal.