One of the best mid-major college baseball conferences in the country will have some of its top prospects shine on a big stage this weekend.

MLB organizations will get the opportunity to select some of the BIG EAST Conference’s best and brightest with the arrival of the 2024 MLB Draft this weekend, and there are most definitely some big names from the league that are and will be gathering eyeballs in major league war rooms over the next few days. 

After entertaining BIG EAST baseball fans for years, these five high-level prospects from the league will now get to begin the next phase of their baseball journeys. And no matter which MLB team those on this list may be selected to, they’ll represent the conference well if they are.

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Here’s a look at some of the BIG EAST’s top prospects ahead of the 2024 MLB Draft, which begins Sunday:

Christian Ficca, 1B, Georgetown

The BIG EAST Player of the Year has a real shot at being the first non-pitcher from Georgetown to be drafted since 2015, when catcher Nick Collins (the Hoyas’ only previous BIG EAST Player of the Year in program history before him) went in the eighth round to the Oakland Athletics. It would be more than deserving if it happened. 

The local product from the D.C. area ripped BIG EAST pitchers apart, slashing .368/.484/.566 in conference play while finishing with 11 home runs and 64 RBIs in all for the year, the latter of which was the second-most in a single season in school history. 

The Hoyas may have just missed out on their first NCAA Regional appearance in program history by falling in the final of the BIG EAST Baseball Championship to St. John’s, but GU has players like Ficca to thank for taking it to new heights and making excellence the standard rather than the outlier. He can add to his legacy even further with a selection in the MLB Draft soon, too.

Brady Afthim, RHP, UConn

Major-league attention has been on Afthim for a while as he was ranked as Maine’s No. 1 draft prospect by Perfect Game out of high school, winning the state’s Gatorade Player of the Year and Mr. Baseball awards his senior year while committed to the Huskies. 

He’s delivered on that potential so far through his junior season with UConn. 

Leading the team with eight saves as a reliable closer, Afthim earned a spot on the All-BIG EAST First Team at season’s end and limited opponents to just a .186 batting average against him for the year. 

He additionally picked up the save in UConn’s 4-1 win against Oklahoma in the Norman Regional en route to the third Super Regional appearance in program history, to boot, showcasing to onlookers some poise in a big situation — a key attribute if a professional future as a pitcher is ahead.

Everett Catlett, LHP, Georgetown

MLB Pipeline, MLB.com’s official sub-site for draft coverage, ranks Catlett as the top prospect out of the D.C. area, and for good reason. 

A towering 6-foot-7 lefty who was crucial in Georgetown’s rise from BIG EAST doormat to conference title contender, Catlett came back from an injury that caused him to miss the entire 2022 season and a year in which he mostly pitched out of the bullpen in 2023 to be one of the league’s best aces in 2024, going 6-1 with a 3.36 ERA (including a 1.80 mark in conference play) and 84 strikeouts in 77⅔ innings pitched. 

Those are numbers not terribly far off from those posted by 2023 Hoyas ace Jake Bloss (8-3, 2.10 ERA, 95 strikeouts in 73 innings pitched), and all he’s done is rocket through the Houston Astros’ system and make his major-league debut within a year of being drafted, as he did last month. Maybe there’s another Hoya hurler ready to make good on a MLB team taking a chance on them.

Carter Dorighi, SS, Butler

One of only two unanimous selections to the All-BIG EAST First Team this past season, Dorighi set a single-season record at Butler (and led the conference) with 90 hits, also leading the BIG EAST in runs and total bases along the way. 

That, on top of the fact that he’s currently tearing it up in the summer MLB Draft League with the Williamsport Crosscutters (.373 average through 26 games as of Friday morning), makes it increasingly likely that he’s going to get selected in the MLB Draft and be the Bulldogs’ first selection since 2019. 

He has an additional advantage in the fact that his brother, Brennen Dorighi, is already a professional player with the Windy City ThunderBolts of the Frontier League, making there already a blueprint close by for Carter to follow on how to get noticed by a pro organization and be ready to emerge on scouts’ radars. It’s safe to say that so far, he’s following that blueprint well.

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