Tuesday, April 26, 2022

PORTLAND, Ore. – A day after earning GNAC Player and Pitcher of the Week honors for a pair of solid individual performances in a split with Saint Martin’s, Montana State Billings freshman Mitch Winter and sophomore Matthew Houlihan have been named the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association’s (NCBWA) Division II West Region Players of the Week.

Winter was named the West Region Player of the Week after a week that saw him bat .667 against the Saints with a .727 on-base percentage and a 1.556 slugging percentage. He went 6 for 9 with five runs scored, four home runs and eight RBI.

Winter went 2 for 2 and hit a two-run homer to account for all of the scoring in the 2-0 second-game win on Friday. He then went 3 for 5 with a two-run homer and a solo shot in the 22-11 opening-game loss before closing the series with a two-run homer in the 16-13 victory in the finale. He enters the week with a .288 batting average and leads the conference with a .625 slugging percentage.

Houlihan earned the regional Pitcher of the Week award after he threw a one-hit shutout in Friday’s win over the Saints. He allowed the one hit and four walks while striking out 11 in his third complete-game performance of the season. He finished the week with a 4.42 earned run average and a 5-3 record. He ranks eighth in the GNAC in earned run average and fourth with 55 innings pitched.

With the split, Montana State Billings improved to 22-20 overall and into third place in the GNAC standings at 13-11. The Yellowjackets will play a four-game series at Northwest Nazarene on Friday and Saturday.