Baseball players Taylor Eckel and Mitch Maier of the University of Toledo and Bowling Green's Kelly Hunt were voted to the All-Mid-American Conference first team.

Maier, a junior catcher, was the 11th player in MAC history to earn first-team honors for three straight seasons. This past season, he set single-season UT records for batting average (.448), hits (87), runs batted in (61) and tied records for doubles (16) and stolen bases (29). His three-year batting average of .414 is the second-highest in league history.

Eckel, a second-teamer last season, hit .325 with 43 RBI as a senior captain. On April 21, the Rockets' second baseman, a Start graduate, was named ``Louisville Slugger'' national player of the week by Collegiate Baseball magazine after hitting .731 (19-for-26) in six games, with a 1.423 slugging percentage and a .767 on-base percentage.

Hunt, a senior first baseman from Central Catholic High, was second in the MAC to Maier with a .439 batting average (sixth nationally) and shared second place in the MAC with Maier with 61 RBIs. He led the MAC with 1.36 RBIs per game and his 75 hits ranked fifth in the MAC despite weather that cut 11 games from the Falcons' schedule.

Earlier this week, Hunt was named MAC West Division player of the week after going 11-for-22 in his final week. He finished his career as BG's career leader in batting average (.399), RBIs (197), total bases (434) and putouts (1,027), and tied for the career lead with 45 home runs.

Brad Snyder of Ball State was named MAC player of the year; Dirk Hayhurst of Kent State was named pitcher of the year, Graham Taylor of Miami was named freshman of the year and Kent State's Rick Rembielak was named coach of the year.

First Published May 22, 2003, 11:52 a.m.