April 29, 2008

LEWISBURG, Pa. - Bucknell senior Jason Buursma (Seattle, Wash./Lakeside School), a baseball co-captain and four-time All-Patriot League honoree, received a special award at the University's annual Senior Athletic Awards Banquet, sponsored by the Bison Club and held in Sojka Pavilion on April 29.

Buursma won the Christy Mathewson Award, presented to the most outstanding athletes in the senior class. Buursma shared the award with women's rowing All-American Katherine Brewster-Duffy.

This recognition is the latest in a long list of honors the Bison two-way player has garnered as he was recently selected as one of 10 national finalists for the Lowe's Senior CLASS Award and named to the Dick Howser Trophy Watch List, which is regarded by many as college baseball's most prestigious award.

Through three-plus seasons with the Orange and Blue, Buursma has become one of the most decorated players in program history, earning four All-Patriot League selections and a spot on the ABCA All-East Region First Team as a relief pitcher in 2006. A two-time member of the NCBWA Stopper of the Year Award watch list, Buursma holds the school's career saves record with 15 and finished 2007 with the second lowest ERA in Patriot League history, 1.65. Buursma broke the school record for home runs last weekend against Lehigh when he hit his 22nd of his career and will finish his time with the Bison ranking in the top-10 career leaders for virtually every major hitting and pitching category, while ranking top-10 in Patriot League history for career saves, ERA and home runs.

As a senior, Buursma is enjoying his most successful campaign yet. Through 32 games in the field, he is leading the Patriot League in batting average (.400), home runs (11), slugging percentage (.725) and has contributed 29 runs scored and 34 RBI. On the mound as the ace of Bucknell's staff, is among the league leaders with a 5-3 record along with 65 strikeouts in 68.1innings of work, averaging 8.56 per nine innings. Buursma boasts a 3.38 ERA and has walked just 10 batters, holding opponents to a .253 average. He was named the Patriot League's Pitcher of the Week back on Mar. 17, marking the fifth overall weekly accolade of his career.

Buursma was taken in 43rd Round of the 2007 Major League Baseball Draft by the Seattle Mariners, but chose to return to Bucknell and complete his college career. The 2007 ESPN The Magazine Academic All-District II First Team honoree carries a 3.64 grade-point average as an economics major with a philosophy minor and has been named to the Patriot League Academic Honor Roll twice and to the Dean's List in six of seven semesters. During the fall of his junior year, Buursma spent the semester studying abroad at Oxford.

Bucknell is a highly-selective, privately endowed liberal arts institution with an enrollment of approximately 3,400 undergraduate students. Bucknell competes in NCAA Division I as a member of the Patriot League and has full membership along with American, Army, Colgate, Holy Cross, Lafayette, Lehigh and Navy. Bucknell has won the Presidents' Cup, signifying the Patriot League's all-sports champion, in 13 of 17 years, including nine of the last 10.

Recently, 17 Bison programs - the seventh-most in Division I - earned NCAA Public Recognition for having Academic Performance Rates in the top 10 percent nationally in their respective sport. In addition, Bucknell ranks fifth in Division I in the total number of CoSIDA Academic All-America selections, with 114 national Academic All-Americans since 1970.