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(December
11, 2007) - Sophomore’s Joey Gonzales and Joe Kelly
were named to the pre-season release of the 2008 Brooks Wallace
Player of the Year Award Watch List on Monday. The Wallace
Award is presented to the nation's top collegiate baseball
player by the College Baseball Foundation. The list will be
cut down throughout the season before the winner will be announced
at the College Baseball Hall of Fame induction ceremony in
July.
Last season, Collegiate Baseball named both players Freshmen
All-Americans and they each earned spots on the Ping! Baseball
Freshmen All-American team, and the Rivals.com Freshmen All-American
Second Team.
Gonzales is coming of an outstanding freshman season in which
he was named Easton Big West Freshman Player of the Year and
earned second team all-conference. The right fielder was UCR’s
leading hitter with a .356 batting average in 54 games. He
was tied for second on the team with 14 doubles and stole
nine bases while adding two home runs and 19 runs batted in.
Gonzales twice had hitting streaks of 14-or-more games.
Kelly also produced in his rookie campaign as the team’s
closer, leading the Highlanders with a 1.32 earned run average
and six saves. He posted a 3-1 record in 22 appearances and
struck out 19 batters in 27.1 innings. Kelly was the Easton
Big West Conference Freshman Pitcher of the Year and a member
of the all-conference first team. He also was selected to
play for Team USA this past summer.
The defending Big West Champion Highlanders open their 2008
season with a four-game series at the UCR Baseball Complex
on February 22-25 against the University of Washington.
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