April 9, 2008

It's time for another edition of Gene's Team, the weekly roundup of the standout athletes here at St. Thomas University. This past week the softball team played their first home game since February but the results were not pleasant for Bobcat fans. They were shutout by Warner Southern twice which gave them a winless week. On the other hand, the baseball team found a little more success. After a tough loss to Northwood, the Bobcats swept Florida Memorial in a weekend series. The team has been floating around .500 for most of the year, but has made a surge winning 5 of their last 6 games. Here are your standout athletes for this week:

Johnny Montoya - Montoya pitched the first game of the weekend series against Florida Memorial and put on a dominant performance. Montoya struck out 3 batters while only allowing 4 hits and 0 earned runs. He pitched a complete game and his hard work earned him a win. Montoya had a bit of a rough start to the season but has started to come around quite nicely. He currently leads the team in strike outs with 27 and is tied for second in the win column. Next up for the baseball team will be a weekend series at conference rival Embry Riddle.

Lance Larimer - There were plenty of reasons why the Bobcats swept the Lions this weekend and one of them was the fact that they could not stop Lance Larimer. In the weekend series with Florida Memorial he had a team high .666 batting average over 12 at bats. He also added 4 RBI's in a very successful weekend for the Bobcats. Larimer is having consistent season batting .294 with 12 RBI's this season. The Bobcats will now head out on an 8 game road trip and will be back home to play Florida Memorial on April 22nd.

Jesus Blanco - Blanco started in the Bobcat's first game on Saturday and earned a spot on this week's team. Blanco pitched 8 innings and struck out 6 batters. He earned the win by only allowing 1 earned run and set up Mauricio Rodriguez for the save. Blanco has been the Bobcats busiest pitcher this season. He leads the team with 5 wins in 11 appearances and is also second to Montoya in strike outs (26). Blanco's team currently sits at an overall record of 17-13 and a conference record of 8-6.

Kelly Diebler - I was a forgettable week for the softball team but Diebler performed well enough to earn a roster spot. She led the team with a .500 batting average in the two shutout losses to Warner Southern. This season Diebler is batting .263 and has a team high .440 on base percentage. The softball team will be back in action this Friday at home against SCAD.