As the season winds down, the post-season picture begins to erase the fog and become clear on who will participate on the playoff’s big stage. Most teams are wrapping-up their regular season games this week and look forward to either post-season play or begin to focus on their game this summer in the TCL.
However, the smaller divisions have already finished out their season and are handing out hardware for player awards. The TCL’s own Josh Vander Hey (Mineral Wells '07) was named to the Red River Athletic Conference First Team. The junior catcher from
Cypress, Texas , hit .381 for Texas Wesleyan and led the team in hits (63), doubles (12), and RBI (55). He also hit four home runs while helping the Rams win the RRAC Championship and advance to the NAIA Region VI Tournament. Vander Hey is just the first of many TCL players that will receive a regular season award.
Pence Making Headlines
Hunter Pence (Highland Park Blue Sox ’04), who was called up April 27 to boost the offense, is carrying one of the hottest bats in the National League. In the series against the San Francisco Giants, Pence has constructed seven straight hits going 7-for-7 with a pair of home runs. The UT-Arlington alum is the first Astros player with seven consecutive hits since Vinny Castilla did it in 2001. He needs one more to tie the team record for consecutive hits set in 1980 by Art Howe. Click here for the full story and links.
Get Ready for the Tryout Camp
The 2007 TCL Tryout Camp is just around the corner. It is on Friday, June 1 at
Colleyville
Heritage
High School at 3:00pm. The TCL Tryout Camp will be used to fill SHORT-TERM ROSTER SPOTS ONLY for the nine TCL teams in 2007. Teams will need to fill these roster spots until fulltime players participating in the NCAA Division I Baseball Tournament report. These roster spots will be for a minimum of five days and could last for as much as several weeks. All fulltime roster positions in the Texas Collegiate League have been filled for 2007. For more information, click here.
TCL Notebook
Here is a look around the nation at stand-out performances by Texas Collegiate League players this week. Stats are through games as of May 16, 2007.
Arkansas
Jess Todd (Coppell Copperheads ‘06) won his second straight Saturday start with his second straight 10-strikeout performance going six innings and only giving up one earned run.
Connecticut
Gordon Stevens (Colleyville LoneStars ‘07) turned in a 2-for-4 showing with a career-high four RBIs, including the game-winning, two run triple in the bottom of the eighth inning to lead the Huskies to a 10-8 victory on Monday. So far this week, Stevens is hammering the ball going 4-for-8 with 7 RBI against
Vermont and Marist.
Houston
Zak Pressley (McKinney Marshals ’07) tallied three 2-hit games last week going 6-for-14 (.428) against Memphis and
Sam
Houston
State.
UH reliever John Touchton (Brazos Valley Bombers ’07) earned the win and improved to 5-6 after holding the Bearkats to only one hit in three shutout innings.
Rice
TCL Freshman of the Year Aaron Luna (Euless LoneStars ’06) went 3-for-4 with a home run and four RBI in a 13-0 blowout of Baylor on Tuesday.
Chris Kelly (McKinney Marshals ’07) pitched six solid innings against Baylor giving up only four hits for zero runs and seven strikeouts for his third win of the season.
TCU
Jake Arrieta (McKinney Marshals '05) went 7 2/3 innings giving up only one earned run with nine punchouts improving his record to 8-3 with a 3.46 ERA.
Chance Corgan (Euless LoneStars ‘05) gave the Frogs a third straight strong weekend start on Sunday going five innings giving up no runs on four hits.
Texas A&M
Kyle Nicholson (McKinney Marshals ‘04) threw his second complete game of the year on Friday to improve to 11-1, 1.74. He only gave up six hits, two runs and struck out nine.
T
exas Tech
Chris Richburg's (Wichita Falls Roughnecks ’06-’07) three-run triple in the bottom of the eighth helped snap a three-game losing skid as Texas Tech dropped New Mexico 9-8 on Monday afternoon at Dan Law Field.
UTSA
The Roadrunners’ leading hitter Trent Lockwood (Wichita Falls Roughnecks ’06-’07) who is hitting .387, went a perfect 5-for-5 to tie UTSA’s single-game record and led the Roadrunners to a come-from-behind 9-5 victory against Nicholls State on Saturday.
UT Tyler
The University of Texas at Tyler placed all eight starting position players and four pitchers on All-American Southwest Conference teams, including Blake Booher (Colleyville LoneStars ‘07). The
Hurst, TX native went 7-0 for the Patriots this season, including throwing two complete game nine inning shutouts. In half of his games, he surrendered one earned run or less and finished the season with a 3.10 ERA.