GREENVILLE, N.C. - ECU's Alec Burleson has accepted an invitation from USA Baseball to the Collegiate National Team (CNT) Training Camp the organization announced today. The standout sophomore is the fourth Pirate in program history to receive an invitation following Pat Watkins (1992), Jake Agnos (2018) and Bryant Packard (2018). Both Agnos and Packard made the 2018 CNT squad and were joined by ECU skipper Cliff Godwin, who served as the third base and hitting coach, helping the Red, White & Blue to a 12-3 record that included series wins over Chinese Taipei, Japan and Cuba.
Regarded as one of the top two-way players in the country after being named a finalist for the 2019 John Olerud National Player-of-the-Year Award along with earning inclusion to five All-America teams as the utility player, Burleson led the Pirates outright in eight offensive categories including batting average (.370), doubles (23), hits (91), RBI (61) and multi-hit games (23), while sharing the team lead in multi-RBI contests (16) and fielding percentage (1.000). He slugged at a .573 clip to stand second on the club and belted nine homers to rank third.
On the mound, he appeared in 24 games making nine starts where he owned a 6-2 ledger with five saves and a 3.28 ERA. Burleson earned his 11th career win against Campbell in an elimination game on June 3 in the 2019 Greenville Regional after working five innings. He fanned 68 batters while walking 26 and struck out a career-high 10 batters against Monmouth on Feb. 23. The lefty allowed 22 runs (all earned) on 56 hits in 60.1 innings and held opposing hitters to a composite .246 average. In the classroom, he is a six-time ECU Director of Athletic Honor member, a 2018 AAC All-Academic selection and was a 2019 Third-Team Google Cloud Academic All-American who boasts a 3.959 cumulative GPA as a business management major.
The USA Baseball Collegiate National Team will participate in series of four intra-squad exhibition games and a game against the Coastal Plain League Select before announcing a 26-man roster prior to the 8th USA vs. Cuba International Friendship Series that will take place July 2-6 in Cary, Charlotte, Durham and Hickory, North Carolina. Team USA's 26-man roster will then travel to Taiwan for the 19th USA vs. Chinese Taipei International Friendship Series after which USA Baseball will announce a final 24-man roster to compete in the 43rd USA vs. Japan Collegiate All-Star Series from July 16-21 in Japan.