UCLA Duo Earn Pac-12 All-Academic honors
June 07, 2018 | Baseball
SAN FRANCISCO โ Nine UCLA baseball players earned Pac-12 All-Acaedmic honors, led by Daniel Rosica and Jake Bird being named first team selections, announced the conference office on Thursday.
Rosica was named a Pac-12 All-Academic first team selection for the third-straight season, while Bird earns his third all-academic team distinction but his first on the Pac-12 All-Academic first team. In addition, Ryan Garcia, Jake Hirabayashi, Ryan Kreidler, Jake Pries, Jack Stronach, Michael Toglia and Jeremy Ydens received honorable mention accolades.
Rosica, a redshirt junior, collects his third consecutive first team honor after posting a 3.78 GPA as a double major in economics and psychology and was named the UCLA Male Scholar-Athlete of the Year. The Fountain Valley, Calif. native started in 30 games behind the plate this season and appeared 49 of the 59 games played. Rosica hit .159 this year with 11 RBIs and nine runs scored, while throwing out 10 runners. In Pac-12 play, Rosica batted .167 with seven RBIs and seven runs scored. He drove in a season-high two runs in help clinch the series sweep of USC at home on April 22. Rosica started his career as a walk-on at UCLA and has gone on to start in over 100 games at catcher in his career.
Bird, a senior right-handed pitcher who was named an Academic All-American earlier today, holds a 3.62 GPA as an economics major. He was named an All-Pac-12 selection after leading the conference in ERA during the regular season and finished the year with a 7-4 record and a 2.18 ERA. The senior finished the year top-10 in the Pac-12 in innings pitched with 111.2 and earned runs allowed with 27. He was drafted in the fifth round of the Major League Baseball draft on Tuesday to Colorado.
Garcia, Hirabayashi, Kreidler, Pries, Stronach, Toglia and Ydens received their first all-academic nod.
To be eligible for selection to the academic team, a student-athlete must have a minimum 3.0 overall grade-point average, be a starter or significant contributor, and have completed at least one year in residence at their current institution.
