Bio

When the awards selection committee tried to make a decision between tennis' Eduardo Mena and baseball's Kevin Strohschein, it wasn't easy to make a decision.

After all, both student-athletes had put together one of the most dominant seasons in recent years – Mena ran the table in Ohio Valley Conference play, while Strohschein took home a lot of hardware with his accolades.

The solution? Give it to them both.

This marks the fourth time that the Tennessee Tech Male Athlete of the Year Award has been split, following suit between 2005 (Willie Jenkins and Frank Omiyale), 2010 (A.J. Kirby-Jones and Chad Oberacker) and 2014 (Daniel Miles and Brandon Thomasson).

Strohschein is the seventh baseball student-athlete to be recognized, joining Mark Maberry (1997), Casey Benjamin (2003), Kirby-Jones (2009, 2010), Oberacker (2010), Miles (2014) and Thomasson (2014).

Strohschein is also the first freshman to win the award.

"Most of the credit goes to my coaches and my teammates," Strohschein said.

For Strohschein, it is perhaps the most impressive debut for any freshman in either Tennessee Tech or Ohio Valley Conference baseball history as the rookie hauled in more accolades than many see in their entire career.

But after seeing the numbers, it's not hard to see why — the McDonough, Ga., native set Tech freshman records in hits, doubles, home runs, runs batted in, runs scored and total bases.

He hit 15 home runs, drove in 73 runs and had 90 hits — the latter two standing as the third-best tallies in school history. He struck for 21 doubles and compiled a .393 batting average and a .707 slugging percentage, just short of Jim Whaley's freshman mark of .516 batting and .730 slugging in 1963.

Strohschein led the Golden Eagles in nine offensive categories.

"It definitely surprised me a bit," Strohschein said. "I knew I could do it, but I didn't know if I could do it this early or even get the chance to do this that early. I didn't even know whether I was going to be starting until opening day. But after that, I just wanted to help the team get some wins and hold my own out there."

Among his honors, the freshman was named to the Perfect Game/Rawlings Freshman All-America first team, Perfect Game/Rawlings All-America Honorable Mention, Baseball America Freshman All-America first team, National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association Freshman All-America first team, a co-recipient of the Louisville Slugger National Freshman Player of the Year with Clemson's Seth Beer, and was named to the Louisville Slugger Freshman All-America team and Louisville Slugger All-America third team.

Before that, Strohschein was the first freshman in OVC history to be named the league's Player of the Year, as well as winning the conference's Rookie of the Year award and was on both the All-OVC first team and all-freshman team.

"That, honestly, has been a shock to me," Strohschein said. "I didn't expect any of that. I was just trying to earn a starting job, so it was very much a surprise to me too."

Strohschein could have as many as three more seasons remaining with the Golden Eagles, and he has no hopes of slowing down any time soon.

"I hope to help us win a couple of OVC championships," he said.