PINEVILLE - Louisiana College junior Rene' Schwartzenburg has been named the Louisville Slugger/NFCA Division III Player of the Week for the week ending May 2, the association has announced.
Schwartzenburg led LC back to the No. 1 spot in the nation in the NFCA Division III Top 25 Poll after losing that position for the first time in almost two months a week ago. Last week, her counterpart for former No. 1 and American Southwest Conference rival Texas-Tyler, junior pitcher Stacy Shepherd, was named Player of the week after leading her team to two victories over LC. Schwartzenburg receives these honors after repeating the feat in the ASC tournament, including a two-hitter in the deciding championship game.
The Marksville, La., native was named ASC tournament MVP after a 4-0 weekend. The tournament started out Thursday night with Schwartzenburg pitching 11 innings and striking out 15 in a 3-2 win over Hardin-Simmons. Then, with LC facing five straight must wins after a loss to Mary Hardin-Baylor (a game in which she did not play), she shutout Concordia Texas, Mary Hardin-Baylor and Texas-Tyler with back-to-back-to-back two-hitters in starts.
The highlight of that stretch was a 10-0 win over Texas-Tyler in the winner-take-all ASC title game. Schwartzenburg also pitched the last inning of an 8-3 win over UTT to force the deciding championship game in the double-elimination tournament.
For the week, Schwartzenburg went 4-0 with three shutouts in 33 innings of work. She gave up 16 hits with eight walks and 28 K's, and her ERA was 0.42.
It was a big week for the Lady Wildcats at the NFCA as LC, which had fallen out of first place the week earlier, regained its spot as the No. 1 team in the nation in the NFCA's latest top 25 poll, the seventh time in the last eight weeks that LC has been ranked No. 1.
The complete NFCA Top 25 was as follows:
1 Louisiana College
2 Texas-Tyler
3 Salisbury
4 Ohio Northern
5 Luther
6 College of New Jersey
7 Cortland State
8 Linfield
9 Messiah
10 East Texas Baptist
11 Christopher Newport
11 Eastern Connecticut
13 DePauw
14 Simpson
15 Central
16 Carthage
17 Brandeis
18 Washington-St. Louis
19 Rowan
20 Wisconsin-LaCrosse
21 North Central
22 Alma
23 Lebanon Valley
24 St. Thomas
25 Alfred
Others receiving votes:
Point totals in parentheses: Claremont-Mudd-Scripps (16); Rivier (15); Virginia Wesleyan (14); Coast Guard Academy (11); Transylvania (10); Southwestern-TX (5); five others received votes but appeared on only one ballot.
Dropped out:
No. 13 Claremont-Mudd-Scripps, No. 23 Rivier, No. 25 Transylvania
