ROCKLAND, Mass. (December 3, 2025) 一 Norwich Sea Unicorns outfielder Antonio Ducatelli is the 2025 recipient of the Futures League’s Pete Wilk Award, it was announced today by Commissioner Joe Paolucci.
The Pete Wilk Award was established to honor the former Vermont Lake Monsters manager who lost a 15-month battle with brain cancer in April 2024. The award is presented to a persevering individual who has overcome injury, illness or personal tragedy to make an impact for their team on or off the field, as that is exactly what Wilk did throughout his life.
A rising junior at Central Connecticut State University and from Levittown, N.Y., Ducatelli returned to the Sea Unicorns for the second straight summer in 2025, and despite twice having his season interrupted due to injuries, he stayed around to be supportive of his teammates while rehabbing diligently to get back in the lineup as fast as he could.
Ducatelli hit .333 with a .439 on-base percentage and three extra-base hits across 14 regular-season games, the last nine of which came after he returned from injury in time for Norwich’s playoff push. He helped the Sea Unicorns win their third straight Futures League championship in August, recording seven hits, four runs scored and two stolen bases during the five-game postseason run.
“Antonio Ducatelli is the type of player that every team would like to have; shows up every day and works hard to make himself and his team better,” said Sea Unicorns General Manager Lee Walter Jr. “He may have worked even harder while out with injuries so that he could come back and finish the summer out with his teammates. This perseverance helped make the Sea Unicorns a tough team to beat late in the season and showed the best qualities of what Futures League baseball is all about!”
The award’s namesake, Wilk joined the Lake Monsters ahead of their inaugural Futures League season in 2021 and became an instrumental figure whose impact touched his players, the Lake Monsters and Burlington community, and the Futures League as a whole. On the field, Wilk’s Vermont teams set single-season league record win totals in the first two of his three seasons at the helm, including the championship-winning 2021 campaign. Those successes led Wilk to becoming the first two-time Futures League Manager of the Year and just the third Futures League Hall of Famer honored exclusively for his coaching career.
The Futures League is proud to recognize Antonio Ducatelli as the second winner of the Pete Wilk Award and looks forward to honoring Wilk’s legacy for years to come.
“Antonio Ducatelli embodies the very essence of the Pete Wilk Award. His resilience in the face of adversity, his commitment to his teammates, and his determination to return stronger after injury reflect the values we strive to honor across the Futures League,” Paolucci said. “While his contributions on the field were impressive, it is his character off the field—choosing to stay, support, and lead by example—that truly sets him apart. Antonio represents the kind of player and person who elevates the game and inspires everyone around him.”
“Pete Wilk was a great coach and an even better person. I know that he would have been honored to have known Antonio as a player and a person,” Vermont Lake Monsters Senior Vice President C.J. Knudsen said. “Congratulations to Antonio on winning this year’s Pete Wilk Award and for representing the characteristics that Pete strived for every day!”
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