NEW YORK—Senior pitcher/utility Paige Rauch (Windsor, N.Y.) swept the BIG EAST Player of the Year and BIG EAST Pitcher of the Year awards on Wednesday morning when the conference office announced the softball major regular season awards and BIG EAST All-Conference teams. Dating back to the inaugural BIG EAST softball season in 1992, no player has previously been voted BIG EAST Player of the Year and Pitcher of the Year in the same season. Rauch was a unanimous selection to the All-BIG EAST First Team and was one of five Villanova players to earn all-conference recognition.
 
Junior catcher Ryan Henry (Ramsey, N.J.) joined Rauch in earning first team all-conference honors, while senior second baseman Angela Giampolo (East Windsor, N.J.), sophomore catcher Ally Jones (Brielle, N.J.) and junior shortstop Megan Kern (Royersford, Pa.) were each named to the All-BIG EAST Second Team. It is the first time since 2016 that the Wildcats have had at least five players recognized on the all-conference teams. Rauch is the only player in program history to be named BIG EAST Player of the Year and she is now a two-time winner of the award having also earned the honors in 2019. She is the fourth Villanova pitcher to be the conference Pitcher of the Year and the first since Brette Lawrence in 2017.
 
Rauch has been a dominant force both at the plate and in the circle this season, with the consistency of her performance particularly standing out. During the 11 weeks of the regular season Rauch earned BIG EAST weekly recognition 10 times, including being named the Pitcher of the Week on five occasions and being chosen for the weekly Honor Roll another five times. In all, Rauch has been selected for weekly honors in 23 of a possible 29 weeks since she came to Villanova.
 
One of four players on the team who has started every game of the 2021 season, Rauch is batting .422 overall with a .523 on-base percentage and a .711 slugging percentage. She has 39 runs scored and 38 runs batted in on the year to go along with 11 doubles, two triples and eight home runs. The production is particularly impressive given that opposing teams frequently pitched around Rauch, who leads the BIG EAST with 31 walks and was intentionally walked three times during regular season BIG EAST play. She led the league in conference games in virtually every statistical category, including batting average (.438), on-base percentage (.614), slugging percentage (.875), walks (21) and runs scored (19).
 
The stats on the mound may have been even more impressive for Rauch, who went 8-0 with a 1.27 ERA in 10 conference starts. She tossed five shutouts among those 10 outings, held opponents to a .193 batting average against her and had 71 strikeouts over 66.0 innings pitched. Rauch has made 25 appearances (22 starts) overall on the season and is 17-3 with a 1.86 ERA and 164 strikeouts. In her final appearance of the regular season, Rauch pitched a two-hit shutout against Connecticut to break the Villanova single-season record with her ninth shutout of the year. Rauch won 15 consecutive decisions at one point during the season and has pitched 16 complete games in 22 starts.
 
Both of Rauch's battery mates behind the plate were among the Wildcats all-conference honorees on Thursday morning. Henry earned the first All-BIG EAST accolade of her career with a first team selection after batting .318 during the regular season with a team-high 12 home runs and 34 runs batted in. She is the only Villanova player other than Rauch to hit as many as a dozen home runs in a single season and she currently boasts a .628 slugging percentage while starting all 44 games the Wildcats have played. Henry's bat was even more dangerous against conference opponents, as she slashed .392/.411/.667 in 17 conference games while hitting four home runs and driving in 13 runs. She was a two-time weekly honoree during the season, including being the BIG EAST Player of the Week on March 15 and earning an Honor Roll nod one week later.
 
Jones had a breakout season for Villanova and emerged as a key bat in the middle of the Wildcats lineup. She enters the postseason batting .391 with a .522 on-base percentage and a .655 slugging percentage while appearing in 34 games with 32 starts. Jones is just a percentage point behind Rauch for the team lead in on-base percentage thanks to drawing 22 walks in just 113 plate appearances on the year. Jones has six doubles, a triple and five home runs on the season, with three of her extra-base hits coming in the same game when she had a career day at Seton Hall. Jones went 3-for-4 with three runs scored and five RBI in the second game of the series against the Pirates and had 11 total bases thanks to hitting two home runs and a triple. She played in 11 conference games with nine starts and hit .367 with a .513 on-base percentage, an .833 slugging percentage and seven extra-base hits (three double, one triple, one home run).
 
The veteran leader on the Wildcats roster is Giampolo, who enters the BIG EAST Championship this week having started 169 consecutive games dating back to her freshman season in 2018. She has earned All-BIG EAST honors three consecutive seasons, including being a first team honoree in 2018 and a second team performer in both 2019 and this season. She is batting .287 on the year with a .379 on-base percentage thanks to drawing 16 walks and leading the team with seven times getting hit by a pitch. Giampolo is second on the team to Rauch with 34 runs scored, leads Villanova with 12 doubles and is also second on the squad with eight stolen bases. She was a tough out in conference games, as her eight walks and five hit by pitch contributed to a .406 on-base percentage.
 
Giampolo has steadily moved up the list of the Wildcats career leaders in several categories. She currently ranks fourth in school history in runs scored (131) and is sixth in both walks (59) and hit by pitch (20). Giampolo also ranks 11^th in school history with a .386 career on-base percentage and is tied for 12^th in doubles (33), as well as 12^th in stolen bases (33) and eighth in stolen base percentage (89.2%).
 
This year marks the first All-BIG EAST honor for Kern, who overcame an injury during the year to start 28 games and play in 11 of the 17 regular season conference contests. She is batting .306 overall and owns a .510 slugging percentage while tying for second on the team with 11 doubles. Kern also has three home runs, 13 runs scored and 15 RBI on the year. She hit .317 with six doubles in BIG EAST play, including a torrid final weekend of the regular season against Connecticut in which she went 5-for-10 with four doubles over three games. As a result of the COVID shortened season in 2020 and missing 16 games during the current season, Kern has essentially played the equivalent of one full season in the Villanova lineup. She has started all 55 games she has played since debuting for the Wildcats last season and is a career .324/.395/.503 hitter with 18 doubles, four home runs and 28 runs batted in.
 
Villanova is riding high with a team that has reached the 30-win plateau for the 14^th time in program history and the first time since 2017. The Wildcats recorded their highest-ever winning percentage in BIG EAST play with an .882 mark (15-2) to earn the #2 seed in this week's conference tournament. Villanova opens play in the 2021 BIG EAST Championship presented by JEEP on Thursday at 3 p.m. when it takes on #3 seed Connecticut at Burrill Family Field in Storrs.