DALLAS (NCBWA) The National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association (NCBWA) released its National Player of the Week awards for the period ending April 25. Kentucky senior first baseman T.J. Collett was named National Hitter of the Week, while San Francisco senior right-handed pitcher Landen Bourassa was named National Pitcher of the Week. The NCBWA Board reviews candidates from each Division I Conference each week and names winners each Tuesday throughout the season.
Collett made a powerful point literally · last week with four home runs in the Wildcats' critically important series win over Alabama that included a sweep of Sunday's doubleheader. The senior first baseman home runs in three consecutive at bats in the second game, giving him 14 on the season to go along with a team-high 45 RBI.
For the week, Collett batted .333 with five runs, seven RBI, four home runs and an OPS of 1.486. He drove in a career-high five RBI vs. Alabama on Sunday as the Cats slammed seven home runs in the second game, tying for the most in a game since the 2005 season.
Collett's three homers on Sunday saw him rocket up UK's career home run list into a tie for second place with AJ Reed, the 2014 Golden Spikes Award winner and fellow Terre Haute, Indiana native. Collett now has 40 career blasts and also entered the school's top 10 list for career RBI with 142.
Bourassa threw a complete-game shutout against Portland on Friday. The Lethbridge, Alberta, natives 16 strikeouts in a single game tied a 75-year-old single-game USF record, when former Don and San Francisco Seal Con Dempsey Jr. struck out 16 against Saint Mary's in 1946. Bourassa had six strikeouts through the first two innings, struck out the side in the seventh, and had at least one strikeout in every inning. He threw only 108 pitches despite the record-tying 16 strikeouts - the sixth-most in the NCAA this season by a pitcher in a single game.
The complete-game shutout was the first thrown by a Don in six years, and marked the longest outing of Bourassa's career. Friday's dazzling performance was just another in a string of strong starts that Bourassa has posted in the month of April. Over his last four starts dating to April 1 versus Loyola Marymount, he's carried a 0.58 ERA with only two earned runs allowed in 31 innings pitched, held opponents to a .156 batting average, and posted a better-than 7-to-1 strikeouts-to-walks ratio with 29 Ks against only four walks. He has gone a minimum of seven innings in all four of those starts, earning the winning decision in all four of them.
Founded in 1962, the NCBWA is dedicated to the advancement of college baseball. Membership is open to writers, broadcasters and publicists of the sport. For more information about the NCBWA, visit the association's official Web site, ncbwa.com.
For more information on the NCBWA Division I National Players of the Week, contact NCBWA Assistant Executive Director Mike Montoro at West Virginia University at 304-293-2821.
2021 NCBWA Division I Players of the Week:
Week ending Feb. 22: Blayne Jones, Dallas Baptist (Hitter); Jordan Wicks, Kansas State (Pitcher)
· Week ending Feb. 28: Dominic Keegan, Vanderbilt (Hitter); Will Dion, McNeese State (Pitcher)
· Week ending March 7: Kenyon Yovan, Oregon (Hitter); Ty Madden, Texas (Pitcher)
· Week ending March 14: Cade Doughty, LSU (Hitter); Jarrett Whorff, Louisiana Tech (Pitcher)
· Week ending March 21: Robby Martin, Florida State (Hitter); Jack Leiter, Vanderbilt (Pitcher)
· Week ending March 28: Caden Grice, Clemson (Hitter); Chayce McDermott, Ball State (Pitcher)
· Week ending April 4: Adrian Del Castillo, Miami (Hitter); Seth Lonsway, Ohio State (Pitcher)
· Week ending April 11: Ivan Melendez, Texas (Hitter); Jonathan Cannon, Georgia (Pitcher)
· Week ending April 18: Aaron Beck, Indiana State (Hitter); Alek Jacob, Gonzaga (Pitcher)
· Week ending April 25: T.J. Collett, Kentucky (Hitter); Landen Bourassa, San Francisco (Pitcher)
· Week ending May 2: Dustin Demeter, Hawaii (Hitter); Tyler Burnham, Seton Hall (Pitcher)
· Week ending May 9: Will Frizzell, Texas A&M (Hitter); Justin Campbell, Oklahoma State (Pitcher)
· Week ending May 16: Ethan Long, Arizona State (Hitter); Andrew Abbott, Virginia (Pitcher)
· Week ending May 23: Cody Littlejohn, Tennessee Tech (Hitter); Cooper Hjerpe, Oregon State (Pitcher)
2021 NCBWA Division I Players of the Month:
February: Wes Clarke, South Carolina (Player); Carson Whisenhunt, East Carolina (Pitcher)
· March: Tim Elko, Ole Miss (Player); Jack Leiter, Vanderbilt (Pitcher)
· April: Christian Encarnacion-Strand, Oklahoma State (Player); Kevin Kopps, Arkansas (Pitcher)
· May: Jack Rogers, Sam Houston (Player); Kevin Kopps, Arkansas (Pitcher)