For the second time in less than a month, senior shortstop Layna Johnson of the Presbyterian College softball team has pilfered the Big South Player of the Week accolade, announced on Monday afternoon by league officials. Seizing the spotlight once again after a Game 2 performance against Radford that spawned a historic stat line, Johnson's laurel represents the eighth time in the past 12 months that a Blue Hose member has received the award.
Simply unstoppable during PC's 9-8 comeback over the Highlanders four days ago – a six-run rally that allowed them to achieve the series victory after a nine-inning thriller in the opener – Johnson repeatedly torched the ball by recording her first career four-hit outing that was accentuated by a game-winning grand slam in the bottom of the 6th.
The second occasion in barely three weeks that the senior has registered a four-run performance and the third time in her Blue Hose tenure reaching that high bar, the Aynor product wrangled in four scores when at the plate while mixing in three stolen bases for good measure. Blasting her 13th collegiate homer to break the Highlanders' spirits and confirm the slow-burn comeback, Johnson cemented an 8-0 PC scoring run on Thursday and the team's 16th home W of the campaign.
Over Presbyterian's 15-year Division I history, the program has seen an individual go for four runs in a single contest 11 times, now with three of those efforts by Johnson. Every one of PC's four-run productions since 2019 has been Layna's doing, jumping ahead to the highest figure on the roster in 2023 with 20 home plate sprints this year.
Climbing to a slugging percentage of .778 in the three-game set against the Virginian visitors, Johnson managed her fifth score of the series in the finale after her incendiary offensive effort in the first half of that doubleheader, responsible for PC's 26th homer of the semester and the first to take place with all bases occupied.
When combining the senior's statistical display in her two instances of being selected the league's Player of the Week (the other nod occurring on March 20), the numbers come out to a .583 batting average (14-of-24), 12 runs scored, six extra-base swings, and a .611 on-base clip.
Head coach David Williams' club returns to Big South action this weekend for the first of consecutive road trips, this one versus Winthrop on a Friday Game 1/Saturday DH combo. The Palmetto State rivals have met in each season since joining the D-I ranks, encompassing 42 games and a Presbyterian sweep over the Eagles in Clinton one year ago.
