United Athletic Conference

PLAYER OF THE WEEK Nevada third baseman Jacob Butler, a freshman from Yelm, Wash. (Yelm HS), hit. 529 (9-17) and had a slugging percentage of 1.176 in four games for the Wolf Pack last week. Butler began the week with a 3-for-4 performance and drove in six runs against San Francisco on Tuesday. He was a single away from hitting for the cycle and also scored three times. Butler had two more games with multiple hits as he opened the San Jose State series with a 3-for-4 day and followed that up going 2-for-5 with two doubles and two RBI on Saturday. For the week, he drove in nine, scored six runs, hit three doubles, one triple and two home runs.

PITCHER OF THE WEEK Rice left-handed pitcher Justin Crowder, a senior from Flower Mound, Texas (Marcus HS/TCU), pitched seven shutout innings versus Louisiana Tech on Friday in Rice's 9-1 victory. He allowed just four hits and two walks and struck out six hitters in lowering his WAC-best ERA to 2.10 on the season.

OTHERS NOMINATED Other player of the week nominations included:
Ben Fritz, Jr., C, Fresno State - hit .615 (8-13) in four games last week and scored four runs, hit two doubles and drove in two runs. He was also walked five times.
Brent Cook, Jr., DH, Hawaii - hit .400 (4-10) in three games. He scored twice with both runs coming in Hawaiis 6-2 victory over Fresno State on Friday.
Dan Preaus, So., OF, Louisiana Tech - was 3-for-8 (.375) in three games against Rice. He hit a two-run homer on Friday and added an RBI single on Saturday.
Vincent Sinisi, Fr., 1B, Rice - hit .600 (9-15) in four wins last week. Sinisi had multi-hit games in all four contests to up his WAC-leading batting average to .416 (.512 in conference games). He also scored six runs, hit three doubles, a home run and had seven RBI.
Gabe Lopez, Sr., 2B, San Jose State - finished the week 7-for-14 and had multiple hits in all three games against Nevada. He also had four RBI, scored four runs and hit three doubles in the series.

Additional pitcher of the week nominations included:
Zach Minor, Sr., Fresno State - pitched his first complete game of the year allowing one unearned run, seven hits and two walks to earn his fifth win of the season.
Chris George, Jr., Hawaii - defeated Fresno State to win his fifth game in his last six starts. George allowed just one earned run on nine hits in eight innings. He also struck out eight batters.
Darrell Rasner, Jr., Nevada - pitched five innings and struck out eight in Nevadas 8-2 win versus San Jose State. Rasner struck out the side in the third inning. In the fifth inning, he was hit by a line drive in the shin, finished the inning to qualify for the win, but was unable to return in the sixth.

RICE AND LOUISIANA TECH EXTEND STREAKS Last week, Rice swept Louisiana Tech to run the Owls winning streak to 11 straight while the Bulldogs have now lost seven in a row. Both streaks are currently the longest in the WAC. It is the second time this season Rice has had an 11-game winning streak. Louisiana Tech lost two of the games by just one run, making this series the second closest for Rice this year. On Saturday, Tech led 6-0 after three innings before Rice rallied and scored three runs in the bottom of the ninth to win 7-6.

TWO WAC SERIES THIS WEEK Only four teams will play conference games this week as Louisiana Tech hosts Nevada and Hawaii travels to San Jose State. Both series begin on Friday evening. Rice is off for 11 days due to spring semester final exams while Fresno State hosts Sacramento State for a three-game series beginning Friday. Earlier this year, Nevada won two of three versus Louisiana Tech and San Jose State won two of three at Hawaii.

NON-CONFERENCE GAMES Beginning today, four teams will play non-conference opponents this week. Nevada hosts Sacramento State and Stanford plays at San Jose State this evening, Louisiana Tech hosts Louisiana-Monroe on Wednesday night and Sacramento State travels to Fresno State for a three-game series this weekend. Earlier this season, Sacramento State won two of three at Hawaii, beat Nevada and lost a game against San Jose State. Stanford won two of three against Fresno State and defeated San Jose State, April 9, 5-4. Louisiana Tech won the only prior meeting against Louisiana-Monroe, 5-3, in 10 innings on March 27.

STREAKING Fresno State third baseman Casey McGehee currently has the WACs longest hitting streak at 23 games. McGehee is hitting .406 (39-96) with 15 RBI and 18 runs during that span. The streak is also the longest in the WAC this year. San Jose State second baseman Gabe Lopez had the longest hitting streak in the WAC this season prior to McGehee when he hit safely in 21 straight games from Feb. 16-March 26.

IN THE POLLS In this weeks polls, Rice is 2nd in the Baseball America poll, 2nd in the Baseball Weekly/ESPN poll and 2nd in the Collegiate Baseball poll. The Owls are also 2nd in the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association poll. San Jose State is ranked 29th in the Collegiate Baseball poll, 36th in the Baseball Weekly/ESPN poll and 31st in the NCBWA poll.

NON-CONFERENCE In non-conference games, the WAC is 87-64 (.576). Fresno State is 12-14 (.462), Hawaii is 11-14 (.440), Louisiana Tech is 13-11 (.542), Nevada is 13-11 (.542), Rice is 19-7 (.731) and San Jose State is 19-7 (.731).

BASEHITS Fresno State: after starting 2-8 at home, Fresno State has won 14 in a row at Beiden Field ... head coach Bob Bennett (who is retiring at the end of the season) is the fifth winningest active coach in Division I with 1,295 victories ... he is seven wins shy of becoming the seventh baseball coach in NCAA Division I history to reach 1,300 wins ... Hawaii: the Rainbows have lost seven of their last eight games ... junior pitcher Chris George has all four conference wins for the Rainbows this year ... junior 3B Brent Cook leads the WAC in stolen bases (16-for-18) ... Louisiana Tech: the Bulldogs have lost 12 of their last 14 games ... the Bulldogs just completed a seven-game stretch against ranked opponents and went 0-7 ... Louisiana Tech lost five of its last six road games by one run ... Tech has an ERA of 4.20, 1.39 better than last year ... Nevada: has lost eight of its last 10 games ... pitcher Darrell Rasner may miss his next start due to a shin injury ... Nevada hit 10 home runs last week, the same number as the rest of the teams in the WAC combined ... senior Curtis Wickwire has 10 hits this season, seven of which are home runs ... the Pack led the WAC in hitting (.316) and home runs (73) last year but are third in hitting (.293) and third in home runs (46) this season ...Rice: has won 27 of its last 31 games (.871) ... Rice is 20-0 in games decided by five or more runs after its 9-1 victory over Louisiana Tech last Friday ... the Owls are 8-2 against ranked teams this year ... Rice has won 17 home games in a row and 15 WAC home games in a row ... Rice leads the WAC in hitting (.331) and ERA (2.81) ... the Owls are the only WAC team with an ERA below 4.00 ... Rice pitchers have struck out 415 batters in 426.1 innings ... in conference games only, the Owls are hitting .370 and have five of the top six hitters in the league led by freshman Vincent Sinisis .512 average ... the Owls have 45 stolen bases, one more than their total from last year ... Rice is one of two teams (Clemson) in the country ranked in the top 20 in batting, pitching and fielding ... Sinisi is the only WAC player with an overall batting average over .400 (.416) ... Sinisi leads the WAC in multiple hit games (25), getting at least three hits in 17 of those games ... senior shortstop Eric Arnold and Sinisi lead the conference in multiple RBI games (14) ... in WAC games only, Rices ERA of 2.70 is 1.87 runs better than San Jose States second best mark of 4.57 ... San Jose State: the Spartans have won nine of their last 10 games ... San Jose State won its fifth extra inning game last week and is the only team in the WAC undefeated in extra inning games ... SJSU is second nationally in fielding percentage (.974) ... the Spartans hit a WAC-high nine doubles versus Nevada on April 27 ... senior second baseman Gabe Lopez has hit safely in 37 of his last 39 games ... Lopez also has the WACs best fielding percentage (.977) for any player with at least 100 assists (110-144-6) ... catcher Adam Shorsher leads the WAC with 12 home runs.

POSTSEASON The WAC does not have a postseason tournament, but the regular season champion as determined by winning percentage in conference games will earn an automatic berth into this years NCAA Tournament which begins May 31.