The Akron Zips baseball team is the varsity intercollegiate athletic team representing the

University of Akron The University of Akron is a public university, public research university in Akron, Ohio, United States. It is part of the University System of Ohio. As a STEM fields, STEM-focused institution, it focuses on industries such as polymers, advance ...

Akron, Ohio Akron () is a city in Summit County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. It is the List of municipalities in Ohio, fifth-most populous city in Ohio, with a population of 190,469 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. The Akron metr ...

, United States. The team plays in the

National Collegiate Athletic Association The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates College athletics in the United States, student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, and Simon Fraser University, 1 in Canada. ...

(NCAA) at the Division I level as a member of the

Mid-American Conference The Mid-American Conference (MAC) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference with a membership base in the Great Lakes region (North America), Great Lakes region that stretches from Western New York to Illinois. Its members co ...

(MAC). The program plays at Skeeles Field, which had been the Zips' home from 1967 to 2015. The program was established in early 1873 during the school's first academic year and played in the

Ohio Athletic Conference The Ohio Athletic Conference (OAC) is an intercollegiate athletic conference which competes in the NCAA's Division III. All member institutions are located in Ohio. Formed in 1902, it is the third oldest athletic conference in the United States ...

(OAC) from 1954 to 1966, the

Ohio Valley Conference The Ohio Valley Conference (OVC) is a collegiate athletic conference which operates in the Midwestern and Southeastern United States. It participates in Division I of the NCAA; the conference's football programs compete in partnership with ...

from 1981 through 1987, and the Mid-Continent Conference for the 1990, 1991, and 1992 seasons. The Zips began competition in the MAC in 1993 and were placed in the East Division when it was created in 2000. The team had one appearance in the

NCAA Division I Baseball Championship The NCAA Division I Baseball Championship is held each year from May through June and features 64 college baseball teams in the United States, culminating in the eight-team College World Series, Men's College World Series (MCWS) at Charles Schwa ...

, which came in

1996 1996 was designated as: * International Year for the Eradication of Poverty Events January * January 8 – A Zairean cargo plane crashes into a crowded market in the center of the capital city of the Democratic Republic of the Congo ...

following their only MAC Tournament championship. Additionally, the Zips won the 1954 OAC championship and the 1991 Mid-Continent Conference title. On July 10, 2015, Akron announced the baseball program would be eliminated, effective immediately, after having fielded the sport since 1873 and uninterrupted since 1947. The university cited budget problems as the main reason for ending the program. A group of baseball alumni formed in an effort to try to save the program. Players were permitted to remain on scholarship to finish their degree, though most transferred to other schools to continue their playing careers. On September 19, 2017, the university announced baseball would return for the 2019–20 academic year. It was announced in Fall of 2018 that the baseball team, resuming play in 2020, would be led by Head coach Chris Sabo, former Major League All-Star and Rookie of the year. His assistants would be Associate head coach Jordon Banfield and Pitching Coach Dan McKinney. , Akron and

Northern Illinois Northern Illinois is a region generally covering the northern third of the U.S. state of Illinois. The region is by far the most populous of Illinois, with nearly 9.7 million residents as of 2010. Economics Northern Illinois is dominated by ...

are the only current or former MAC schools not to have a player named the MAC Baseball Player of the Year or MAC Baseball Pitcher of the Year since those awards were first given in 1986 and 1988 respectively.

NCAA Tournament

Akron has participated in the

NCAA Division I baseball tournament The NCAA Division I Baseball Championship is held each year from May through June and features 64 college baseball teams in the United States, culminating in the eight-team Men's College World Series (MCWS) at Charles Schwab Field Omaha in Oma ...

once.

Major League Baseball

Akron has had 22

Major League Baseball Draft The Major League Baseball draft (officially the Rule 4 Draft; also known as the first-year player draft or amateur draft) is the primary mechanism by which Major League Baseball (MLB) assigns amateur baseball players from high schools, colleg ...

selections since the draft began in 1965.

References

External links

* Baseball teams established in 1873 Baseball teams disestablished in 2015 {{Ohio-baseball-team-stub