March 9, 2004

George Mason freshman Josh Campbell has quietly gone about his business this year, doing nothing off the field to draw attention to himself. Instead, he has let his performance on the field and at the plate, where he bats ninth, do all the talking.

The outfielder from Warrenton, Va. (Fauquier High School) is no longer going unnoticed. It's only taken him three weeks to draw the attention of the Colonial Athletic Association as Campbell was named the CAA Rookie of the Week for the week ending March 7.

In four games last week, Campbell batted .400 (6 for 15) with two homers, five RBI and three runs scored as the Patriots went 4-0 and improved to 9-1. He had a solo homer in a 4-2 win over Virginia Tech, smaked a three-run homer in a 22-2 rout of Canisius and was 3 for 5 in a 14-0 victory, also over Canisius.

Before finding out about the accolade, he kept up the strong hitting, going 2 for 2 against N.C. State on Tuesday as the Patriots beaten the nationally-ranked Wolfpack. He scored a run in the game and successfully laid down a pair of sacrifices.

For the year, Campbell is batting .333 with 13 hits in 39 at-bats. He has scored 10 runs, driven in nine runs and hit three doubles and three home runs. He is slugging .641, is 3 for 4 on stolen bases and has not committed an error.

In three weeks of action, three different Patriots have been honored by the CAA in three different categories. After a 3-0 start, Jeff Palumbo was named co-Player of the Week. After improving to 5-1, Jake Glanzmann earned CAA Pitcher of the Week. After extending their record to 9-1, Campbell was honored.

After his start on Tuesday against N.C. State, Stacen Gant made a good case to be honored as next week's Pitcher of the Week. He'll have to wait a week to find out.