A trio of Eastern Washington University football seniors — kicker Roldan Alcobendas, center Spencer Blackburn and nose tackle Jay-Tee Tiuli — have been selected to the Associated Press NCAA Football Championship Subdivision All-America team announced Tuesday.
“It’s certainly incredible — these acknowledgments are team-based even though they are individually driven,” Eastern head coach Aaron Best said. “Jay-Tee is a fabulous player and the MVP in the conference. Spencer in my humble opinion is the best center in this league even though he was just a second-team all-league player. Roldan is Roldan, and every week he seems like he brings an honor in. When he leaves Cheney he’s going to have to rent a U-Haul to carry home his hardware.”
“They are very deserving of these accolades — they earned them,” Best added. “Even though they are individual awards, it helps to be on a team that won a lot of games and has had a lot of success.”
Alcobendas, a graduate of Camas High School, becomes only the third All-America kicker in EWU’s history as a member of FCS, and the first since Jimmy Pavel was honored as a first team All-American in 2012. Alcobendas was honored one day earlier with the Fred Mitchell Award as the top place-kicker among FCS, NCAA Division II, NCAA Division III, NAIA and NJCAA schools. He also earned first team All-Big Sky Conference honors as both a kicker and punter in the 2018 season.
