George Washington University

May 25, 2004

WASHINGTON, DC - The Colonials had five baseball players named to the Atlantic 10 All-Conference first team. Additionally, freshman Anthony Smith was named the A-10 Rookie of the Year following in fellow All-Conference team member Tom Shanley's shoes who won the award last year. GW has won the last two rookie awards and three in five years. Brad Rosenblat was also named to the Academic All-Conference team.

Joining Smith and Shanley on the All-Conference first team are junior outfielder Anthony Raglani, junior starting pitcher Dan Sullivan and freshman closer Derrik Lutz. The Colonials had five of the 12 first team members and were the only team with more than two. GW had two of the three freshman honored and two of the three first team pitchers.

Smith won first team honors as the designated hitter but also pitched for GW throughout the season. Smith had earned a conference-best five Rookie of the Week awards making him a virtual lock for the Rookie of the Year award. Smith leads the league with 67 RBIs and is second in homers with 15 and slugging percentage with a .718 mark. Smith is also an imposing pitcher with a 6-2 slate in 14 starts featuring 65 strikeouts.

Sullivan won all eight of his conference starts while posting a 10-3 mark this season. The junior needs one more win to tie GW's single-season record set by former teammate Greg Conden. Sullivan is second in the A-10 with 83 strikeouts while posting a 3.84 ERA.

Freshman closer Lutz has already set GW's single-season record with 11 saves. He leads the conference in saves and had eight saves in league games alone. Although just a freshman, Lutz is already second on the Colonials all-time saves list with 11 in his career.

Junior left fielder Raglani enters the A-10 tournament within striking distance of two single-season records for the Colonials. Raglani needs five runs and six walks to tie GW's single-season marks set in 2002 and 1981 respectively. Despite being just a junior, Raglani is currently tied for fifth all-time at GW with 46 career doubles.

Sophomore second baseman Shanley was named to the first team after earning second team honors last season at shortstop. Shanley had a team-high 12 game hitting streak and had a hit in 23 of 24 consecutive games earlier in the season.

The Colonials also had one member of the Academic All-Conference team, junior Rosenblat. Rosenblat a right fielder has a 3.74 grade point average while pursuing a degree in accounting. In addition to his academic excellence, Rosenblat has been outstanding offensively batting .322 with 48 runs, 43 RBIs, 13 doubles, and 10 home runs.

GW begins play in the conference tournament on Thursday at 3:30 p.m. at Dodd Memorial Stadium in Norwich, CT. GW will play the winner of third seed Richmond and sixth seed Duquesne. The Colonials finished the regular season 40-16, their best winning percentage since 1959. GW has never before won 40 games in the regular season.