Luke Fikar doesn’t just live in Title Town. He keeps adding to the trophy case.
The 2023 Sickles High graduate helped the University of Tampa make history June 6, closing out an 8-4 win over West Chester University in Cary, North Carolina, to give the Spartans the first three-peat in NCAA Division II baseball history. Fikar was named the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player after winning three games on the mound and going 6-for-17 with two RBIs at the plate.
Now the submarine-style reliever has a championship ring for each hand — both earned with the same pitching arm.
“It’s unbelievable, a dream come true and, honestly, still surreal,” Fikar told the Beacon. “Every day it hits me more, and I keep looking at videos of (the win and us celebrating), and I was talking to guys from last year’s championship team and they said, ‘It really doesn’t hit you until you get the (championship) ring,’ and maybe they’re right, because it still hasn’t really hit me. It just feels incredible to be a part of (the three-peat).”
Fikar isn’t far removed from his last title. In May 2023, he helped Sickles win the first state championship in program history, a Class 6A title over Viera in Fort Myers. The two clinching games were almost eerily alike.
In Game 3 against West Chester, Fikar came on for 4 1/3 innings of relief. He gave up three runs on six hits but recorded the final out — and the win — before his teammates mobbed him on the mound. In the 2023 state final, he was again the Gryphons’ only call to the bullpen, this time throwing two scoreless innings, getting the last out and getting mobbed all over again.
Two moments not lost on Fikar.
“That’s crazy, right?” he said, knowing the answer. “But getting the final out in both games, that means the world to me. I’ll be showing those videos and photos to people forever.”
Fikar isn’t alone. He is one of 10 players on this year’s championship roster who played for and graduated from local high schools — and he won’t be the last.
Weeks after winning his ninth title with the Spartans — one as a player in 1992 and eight as coach (2006, 2007, 2013, 2015, 2019, 2024, 2025 and 2026) — coach Joe Urso is already adding more local talent, announcing that former Carrollwood Day pitcher Nick Riedel and former Gaither pitcher C.J. Hanson will both join next year’s team.
Urso, who won a state title at Plant in 1988, knows local talent. He has long mined it through recruiting, and even more now through the transfer portal, landing players who starred at other programs and want to make the jump to Division II — or come home.
Fikar fit the mold. In two seasons at Hillsborough Community College, he batted .339 with 45 RBIs and struck out just 38 times, and he posted a 3.99 ERA with 27 strikeouts, 15 walks and 41 hits allowed. He didn’t give up a home run all season — until West Chester took him deep in Game 3 of the championship series.
“He was already a plus defender — he can play any infield position, including shortstop — but that sidearm, submarine angle was very attractive,” said Urso, who was MVP of UT’s 1992 national championship team. “It almost comes at you from a shortstop angle, so he had lefties off balance as much as righties. West Chester was really good offensively, and he was the only answer we had in Games 1 and 3.
“We knew he was going to be special as a two-way player, which is rare here.”
Fikar was another first for Sickles — the first Gryphon that coach Eric Luksis, himself a former UT player and national champion, sent to his alma mater.
“In my 10 years at Sickles, I have been waiting for the right guy who I knew would represent that university the way it deserves, and Luke was the perfect guy for it,” said Luksis, a member of UT’s 2013 national championship team. “What he was able to do for Tampa this year is exactly what he did for us in 2023 to help us win our state championship. He’s got the competitiveness and the edge to start in the lineup and then come in to close out a game.
“He was built for that.”
Urso saw it, too. A bullpen injury early in the season forced him to lean on Fikar more in relief, and Urso admits he was “babying him,” wary of overworking him. But the extra innings meant fewer at-bats, and the Spartans’ offense sputtered.
Only when Urso found the balance — and saw how badly Fikar wanted to be on the field, at the plate or on the mound — did the offense come alive, sparked by Fikar’s .296 average, 16 RBIs on 29 hits, 13 walks and 22 runs. He also went 5-0 with a 1.96 ERA, allowing 31 hits and striking out 42.
“We wouldn’t have had a chance without him,” Urso said.
Still, despite living and growing up playing ball in Tampa, don’t call him Mr. Title Town. At least not yet.
“I don’t know — maybe I am,” Fikar said. “I really haven’t thought about it, and there are so many guys from Tampa who played for Tampa. It really is still so surreal, going to Cary, North Carolina, for 12 days and getting it done for a hometown team I’ve always watched and rooted for.
“Getting the last out in a state championship and a national championship — that’s crazy.”
Hometown Heroes
Luke Fikar is far from the only local product to play for the University of Tampa. Here are his teammates and coaches who played for and graduated from Tampa-area high schools, joining a long line of locals in the Spartans’ baseball record books:
• Gunnett Carlson, Berkeley Prep
• Jack Martinez, Jesuit
• Jake Turer, Wharton
• Robert Satin, Plant
• A.J. Graham, Gaither
• Kenney Robinson, Hollins
• Merric Hunt, Northside Christian
• Garrett Hill, Plant
• Maddox King, Tampa Catholic
• Joe Urso, Plant
• Sam Militello, Jefferson