Monday, April 26, 2004

MORAVIAN’S BORTZ NAMED COMMONWEALTH SOFTBALL PLAYER OF THE WEEK

ANNVILLE, PA --- Junior shortstop Heather Bortz (Allentown, PA/Parkland HS) of the Moravian College softball team has been named the Commonwealth Conference Player of the Week for her performance last week.

Bortz, who has been named the Commonwealth Conference Player of the Week three times this season, helped Moravian post a 4-0 record in Commonwealth Conference action last week to clinch the program’s first-ever undefeated conference season at 14-0. The Greyhounds were 4-2 overall last week, having their 29-game winning streak snapped in a doubleheader loss to William Paterson (NJ) University. Bortz hit .667 last week with 14 hits in 21 at-bats. She hit safely in all six games after having her NCAA all-division record consecutive game hitting streak stopped at 44 games in the final contest of the prior week. Her final hit of the week, her fifth hit in a doubleheader at Widener University, was the 180th of her career, tying the Moravian career record. Bortz was on-base in 17 of 24 plate appearances (.708 percentage) last week. She added ten runs scores, four RBIs, four stolen bases, three walks and two doubles. In the field, Bortz had 11 putouts, seven assists and two errors.

Moravian, the top ranked team in the country, is 31-3 overall and clinched the top seed in the Commonwealth Conference Tournament with a perfect 14-0 conference record during the regular season. Moravian is slated to return to action on Friday, April 30th in the Commonwealth Conference Tournament at Lebanon Valley College when the Greyhounds will play fourth seeded Juniata College at 11:00 a.m. The winner of the conference tournament receives an automatic berth into the 2004 NCAA Division III Tournament.