07/24/07

The College of St. Scholastica announced today that junior outfielder Blake Eller (Brainerd, Minn.) will sign a contract with the Madison Mallards of the Northwoods League on Wednesday and begin playing for the Mallards on Wednesday night in Mankato.

Madison leads the Northwoods League in attendance averaging 5,962 fans per game and the Mallards have drawn more than 125,000 fans to the Duck Pond this summer. They are four games out of the South Division lead with 19 games to play in the regular season.

Eller, the UMAC postseason tournament MVP for the tournament-champion Saints, was the 2007 UMAC Player of the Year after leading the league in batting (.429), slugging percentage (.748), runs scored (67), hits (63), runs batted in (58), triples (12), and total bases (110). He was among the Division III national leaders in slugging percentage, RBIs per game (1.35), and walks per game (0.84), tied for the national lead in triples, and led the country in runs per game (1.56).

This past May, Eller and his teammates won their 11th UMAC title in a row and earned an at-large bid to the NCAA D-III national tournament for the third consecutive season and fourth time in their history.