Student-athletes from institutions in the American Southwest Conference and Southern Athletic Association logged remarkable performances on the diamond in February and took home the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association Div. III Awards for the month of February. To provide flexibility with the ongoing pandemic, the decision was reached by the Div. III selection committee to encompass all the games in February for this week’s selections. We will resume our traditional weekly selections and weekly submission criteria next week with the uptick in Div. III teams slated to begin action this week.
HITTER OF MONTH
Senior catcher Ty Morgan is a big reason why Louisiana College is off to a 6-2 start. Morgan hit .538 (14-for-26) in February with four runs, five doubles, a triple, two homers, and 12 RBI. He’s thrown out 50 percent (3-of-6) of base runners trying to steal. Morgan has five multi-hit games and already has a trio of three-hit outings. He blasted two homers while going 3-for-4 with five RBI in a season-opening 12-6 win over Alma College.
Honorable Mention Hitter: Tyler Calvert, Sr., 1B, Berry College – Played and started in all 12 games for the Vikings. Hit .383 (18-for-48) on the month with 24 RBI, six homers, three doubles, and two triples. Calvert’s slugging .915 on the year, has only struck out twice, and recently became the all-time Div. III-era leader in homers at Berry.
PITCHER OF MONTH
Belhaven University sophomore right-hander Brett Sanchez is off to a 3-0 start, and he hasn’t allowed an earned run over 24 innings. Sanchez has allowed two unearned runs, has struck out 26 batters, and is holding the opposition to a tidy .161 average. He opened the season with nine strikeouts in eight innings of work during a 9-1 win over Piedmont College. He went the distance en route to a three-hit shutout during a 5-0 win over Centenary College of Louisiana and struck out eight. Most recently, Sanchez fanned nine over seven innings in a 17-2 win against Hardin-Simmons University.
Honorable Mention Pitcher: Quinn Gudaitis, Sr., Illinois Wesleyan University – Was exceptional on the mound in Illinois Wesleyan’s 12-1 season-opening win over Greenville University on February 26. Gudaitis struck out 10, one off his career-high, while allowing just two hits over six innings of work. For the season, he leads the College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin in earned run average (0.00), opponent batting average (.100), strikeouts (10), batters struck out looking (6), and runs allowed (0).
ROOKIE OF MONTH
Berry College’s Levi Cloud currently leads the Vikings with a .432 average (16-for-37). Cloud, who has started 10 of 12 games, has five doubles and eight RBI on the year. Defensively, the third baseman sports a .950 fielding percentage with one error in 20 chances.
2021 WINNERS
• Month of February: Ty Morgan, Louisiana College (Hitter); Brett Sanchez, Belhaven (Pitcher); Levi Cloud, Berry (Rookie)
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