Ryan Berry
Rice junior RHP Ryan Berry becomes the first player in Conference USA history to earn Pitcher of the Week honors in three consecutive weeks after he shut down No. 20 San Diego last Friday for this third straight nearly flawless outing. The Hitter of the Week honor went to UAB junior C Digger Towe, who piled up huge numbers while leading UAB to a 6-0 record last week.
In a 4-1 victory against nationally-ranked San Diego, Berry pitched a complete game, one-hitter for his third-straight win. He carried a perfect game into the seventh inning and no-hitter into the eighth, but finished with a complete game one-hitter where he also hit a batter (the hit-batsman is what lost the perfect game in the seventh). For the third week in a row, the native of Humble, Texas did not walk a batter and he struck out eight. He saw his streak of 26.1 consecutive innings without allowing any runs come to an end, but he still has a streak of 28.2 consecutive innings without allowing an earned run. In four starts this season, Berry has a 1.42 ERA and he has held all opposing hitters to a composite .088 batting average.
This is Berry’s seventh career C-USA Pitcher of the Week honor, the most in league history. Shane Nance and Brad Sullivan, both of Houston, had held the record with six weekly honors.
Towe finished the week with a .571 batting average (12-for-21) and a .600 on-base percentage while striking out just once in 25 plate appearances. He managed multiple hits and multiple RBI in five of UAB’s six games as he helped the Blazers to a perfect 6-0 record over the past week. Towe tallied eight RBI in a two-game midweek series with UT Martin and added eight more in four games over the weekend with Harvard to finish the week with 16 RBI. He posted a 1.095 slugging percentage for the week as seven of his 12 hits went for extra bases on five doubles and two home runs. Towe also scored 10 runs on the week to have his hand in 26 UAB runs on the week.
