Local Roundup: GWU's Redmond, Stroupe take top Big South honors

College baseball

Redmond, Stroupe take top Big South honors: Gardner-Webb senior infielder Chandler Redmond has been named the 2019 Big South Conference Baseball Player of the Year, in addition to earning First-Team All-Conference and All-Academic Team honors. Head coach Rusty Stroupe was also named 2019 Big South Baseball Coach of the Year while senior catcher Justin Kunz was also named First-Team All-Conference.

Redmond finished the regular season as the Big South’s top power hitter, leading the league in home runs (18), RBI (58) and slugging percentage (.672). He posted a .306 batting average along with a team-best .414 on-base percentage as he drew a team-high 33 walks.

The Middletown, Maryland, native put his stamp all over the record books this season, setting the single-season home run mark at 18, breaking the record set by Danny Sullivan in 2017. With his 39th career home run on March 27, Redmond also broke the program’s all-time home run record set in 2000 by Sammy Pruett.

Redmond finished the regular season with 50 career home runs, becoming only the third player in Big South Conference history to reach that mark and is three behind the all-time record set by Winthrop’s Jason Colson in 2001.

Redmond is the first Runnin’ Bulldog to earn Big South Player of the Year honors.

Kunz led the team in batting average at .324, belting a team-high 14 doubles as well as 11 home runs. The Wake Forest native was recently named one of 14 semifinalists for the 2019 Buster Posey Award, given to the nation’s top catcher.

Stroupe led an injury-riddled Gardner-Webb team to a fifth-place finish in the Big South regular season standings this year, with the team taking five of their last six league matchups.

This marks the Cherryville native’s first Coach of the Year award while at the helm of the Runnin’ Bulldogs.

Earlier this season, Stroupe announced that he will be retiring from coaching at the conclusion of the year. He will leave Gardner-Webb as the program’s all-time wins leader, guiding the Runnin’ Bulldogs to 481 victories thus far in 17 seasons.

College swimming

GWU names new swimming coach: Gardner-Webb has announced the hiring of Mike Blum as head coach of its men’s and women’s swimming programs in advance of the 2019-20 season.

Blum, who was an assistant at Gardner-Webb for the 2011-12 season, returns after most recently spending time on the staff at the University of North Carolina, where he helped guide seven swimmers to qualify for the 2019 NCAA Division I Championships.

Prior to joining the staff at North Carolina, Blum was the head coach at Florida Southern College in Lakeland, Fla. for three seasons. His teams totaled 45 NCAA Division II qualifiers, and had 88 NCAA D-II All-American award winners. He had two relay teams win NCAA championships, as well as one individual championship and was named the 2016 CSCAA Men’s Swimming National Coach of the Year.

When Blum was an assistant at Gardner-Webb, his swimmers set six new school records. That season, the men’s team placed third at the 2012 Coastal Collegiate Sports Association (CCSA) Championships, while the women’s squad took home a fourth-place result.