SEC gets benefit of doubt in Golden Spikes Award; Arkansas' Aloy wins

Razorbacks' shortstop becomes third straight SEC player to win award

Arkansas Razorbacks shortstop Wehiwa Aloy at the plate against the Texas Longhorns at Baum-Walker Stadium in Fayetteville, Ark. / Nilsen Roman-HogsonSI Images

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — It's always difficult to pick a winner for awards in baseball, especially college baseball. Arkansas shortstop Wehiwa Aloy won the Golden Spikes Award over Florida State's Alex Lodise and Tennessee's Liam Doyle.

There's no right answer. There's no head-to-head metric. Hitters never face each other. Committees can only go off the level of production that each player produces against the rest of their schedule.

🌟 WEHIWA ALOY IS GOLDEN 🌟 pic.twitter.com/hYhgDOscRT

— Golden Spikes Award (@USAGoldenSpikes) June 21, 2025

There are cases in which numbers just don't lie. Florida State's Alex Lodise should have been the winner of the 2025 Golden Spikes, not Arkansas' Aloy.

Aloy becomes the third winner in school history, joining Andrew Benintendi in 2015 and Kevin Kopps in 2021.

All three finalists had great seasons. Tennessee's Liam Doyle finished with a program-record 164 strikeouts. Aloy finished with 21 homers. This was one of the closest Golden Spikes Award races in recent memory.

Florida St. infielder Alex Lodise (1) reacts to his double at second base during the first inning of an NCAA college baseball matchup Tuesday, March 25, 2025 at VyStar Ballpark in Jacksonville, Fla. FSU rallied to defeat UF 8-4 off a walk-off grand slam from Alex Lodise in the ninth inning. / Corey Perrine/Florida Times-Union / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Three different shortstops won three prestigious awards for college baseball. Lodise won the Dick Howser Award. Lodise won the Dick Howser Award, the Player of the Year handed out by the National College Baseball Writers Association (NCBWA).

UCLA's Roch Cholowsky, who was a Golden Spikes Award semifinalist, won the Brooks Wallace Award, given to the best shortstop in the country.

UCLA Bruins shortstop Roch Cholowsky (1) completes a double play against the Murray State Racers during the second inning at Charles Schwab Field. / Steven Branscombe-Imagn Images

Choosing Lodise over the other finalists isn't meant to diminish the winner, but there can only be one winner.

Lodise slashed .396/.465/.715 with 17 homers and 18 doubles.

Aloy hit .350/.434/.673 with 22 homers and 19 doubles. The fielding percentages were within one-thousandth of a percentage point.

It's the first time since at least 2008 that a player won the Golden Spikes Award over someone who led in batting average, on-base percentage and slugging percentage.

The SEC has dominated college baseball in recent years. The last five winners of the College World Series have come from the conference from five different schools.

The conference also set a record for the most teams ever put in the NCAA Tournament with 13. There is no question that SEC is the strongest conference, but the ACC is a clear, but not distant second.

The ACC sent nine teams into the field and Lousiville to Omaha.

Not only did Lodise become the first position player to lose the award leading in all three categories of the triple slash, he had Aloy beat by 30 points in each category, including 41 points in batting average.

To give context for what the means across a 60+ game season, Aloy would have to get a hit in his next 21 at-bats without making an out to just tie Lodise in batting average. 21 games is at least five games worth of at-bats.

Arkansas made the deeper postseason run, and Aloy had the better stats in the tournament, but the award is and always will be a holistic view of the season.

The SEC is the best conference in baseball, but not 30+ points better in slugging and on-base. The last three winners of the Golden Spikes Award have been from the SEC, but the latest sets a precedent that no other conference will be respected moving forward if a player is not part of it.

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