CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- Illinois first baseman Bren Spillane was named Big Ten Player of the Week for the second straight week, the conference office announced Monday. Spillane shares the award with Michigan's Jonathan Engelmann, giving Illinois its fourth straight Big Ten Player of the Week honor.
Illinois is the second team in Big Ten history to win four straight Big Ten Player of the Week awards. The only other team to accomplish the feat is Illinois' 2015 squad, which won the last four of the season April 27-May 18, 2015 (Casey Fletcher, David Kerian, Jason Goldstein, Kerian).
Spillane went 9-for-14 with three homers during four games, one week after going 9-for-15 with three homers, to take home his second straight award. He led the Illini in nearly every offensive category to help bump Illinois' national ranking to No. 12 by Collegiate Baseball Newspaper, No. 22 by Baseball America and No. 25 by D1Baseball.com.
Spillane Weekly Notes
• Led Illinois in average (.643), on-base percentage (.737), slugging (1.500), doubles (3), homers (3), RBIs (10), runs (7), total bases (21), walks (5) and steals (3) during the week
• Reached base at least three times in every game of the week
• Two HR against CSUN on Tuesday
• Eight RBIs against CSUN is the most by a Big Ten player this season
• Homered against Northwestern on Friday
• Scored the winning run in extra innings against Northwestern on Saturday
• 3-for-4 in the extra-inning win against Northwestern on Sunday
• At least one extra-base hit in all four games of the week
• 3-for-4 on steals during the weekend against Northwestern
2018 Baseball Players of the Week
Feb. 19
PL: Jacson McGowan, Jr., PUR
P: Taylor Bloom, Sr., MD
F: Eric Heatter, RU
Feb. 26
PL: Terrin Vavra, Jr., MINN
P: Pauly Milto, Jr., IND
F: Bo Hofstra, PUR
March 6
PL: Michael Massey, So., ILL
PL: Matt Gorski, So., IND
P: Karl Kauffmann, So., MICH
F: Elijah Dunham, IND
March 12
PL: Doran Turchin, Jr., ILL
P: Luis Alvarado, Sr., NEB
F: Mason Erla, MSU
March 19
PL: Bren Spillane, Jr., ILL
P: Jonathan Stiever, Jr., IND
F: Jordan Nwogu, MICH
March 26
PL: Bren Spillane, Jr., ILL
PL: Jonathan Engelmann, Jr., MICH
P: Brady Schanuel, Jr., IOWA
P: Hunter Parsons, Jr., MD
F: Patrick Fredrickson, MINN
F: Harry Rutkowski, RU
