Montclair, NJ (4/28/08) – The Montclair State softball team picked up two more awards on Monday as senior righthander Carolyn McCrea (Wharton, NJ / Jefferson) was named the NJAC Pitcher of the Week while freshman leftfielder Leslie Gonzalez (North Bergen, NJ / North Bergen) earned Rookie Player of the Week honors.
Both
helped No. 6 MSU to sweeps of William Paterson and Rowan as the Red
Hawks claimed the NJAC regular-season championship for the second
consecutive year. Montclair will be the No. 1 seed and host for the
NJAC Tournament which gets underway on Tuesday, April 29. The Red Hawks
will take on William Paterson at 4:00 pm in a first-round game before
the entire tournament shifts to MSU for games May 2-4.
McCrea was solid in her two starts this week as she allowed just one
earned run in picking up a pair of wins. In 14 innings, she allowed 13
hits, struck out nine and walked three. Against William Paterson, she
scattered seven hits, fanned four and walked one as MSU took the first
of two against William Paterson with a 7-0 victory. She then gave up a
run on six hits with five strikeouts in collecting her league-leading
19th win in a 2-1 Game 1 victory against No. 16 Rowan.
Gonzalez
batted .750 with a slugging percentage of .833 and on-base average of
.750 in the 4-0 week. Gonzalez was 9-for-12 and drove in five runs
while scoring twice. She was 5-for-6 with an RBI and stolen base in
each game as MSU swept William Paterson. In the second game, Gonzalez
had an RBI as part of the Red Hawks' five-run seventh in the nightcap
in an 8-7 win. She then went 4-for-6 with three RBI, a double and run
scored as Montclair finished off its conference schedule with a pair of
one-run win versus Rowan.