AFCA Release

COLLEGEVILLE, Minn. – Saint John's University senior offensive tackle Ben Bartch (Dayton, Ore./Blanchet Catholic) was named one of 22 student-athletes, across all divisions of college football, to the 2019 Allstate American Football Coaches Association (AFCA) Good Works Team on Thursday, Sept. 12.

The award was established in 1992 to recognize a select group of college football players who have made a commitment to service and enriching the lives of others.

A fan vote will run from now until Nov. 22 at www.ESPN.com/Allstate to decide this year's Allstate AFCA Good Works Team Captain, who will be recognized during the national ESPN broadcast of The Home Depot ESPNU College Football Awards in December. 

Bartch is the fourth Johnnie to be named to the Allstate AFCA Good Works Team and the third consecutive. The player whose blind side Bartch protects, senior quarterback Jackson Erdmann (Rosemount, Minn.), was named to the 2018 Allstate AFCA Good Works Team. Wide receiver Will Gillach '19 was a Good Works Team honoree in 2017 and defensive end Kevin McNamara '07 was SJU's first to achieve the distinction in 2006.

The 2019 Allstate AFCA Good Works Team will be invited to New Orleans to participate in a special community service project ahead of the 2020 Allstate Sugar Bowl, where the entire team will also be recognized on the field at halftime on New Year's Day.

Earlier this season, sports information directors from Division I, Division II, Division III and NAIA schools across the country submitted nominations of players they felt best embodied the spirit of the Good Works Team award. A voting panel was faced with a list of 137 nominees that was narrowed down to the 22 student-athletes and an honorary coach, Clemson's Dabo Swinney, named to the team.

A 2018 All-MIAC second-team selection, Bartch started all 13 games at left tackle (695 snaps) in 2018. He received a 1.87 grade on a 0-2 scale by his offensive line coach last fall and received the highest grade among SJU's offensive linemen in the NCAA quarterfinal game against eventual national champion Mary Hardin-Baylor (1.89/2).

Bartch played tight end his first two seasons as a Johnnie and caught four passes for 43 yards (10.8 avg.) and a touchdown in eight games in 2017. He switched to offensive tackle during the offseason and started on the left side immediately. His athleticism and size (6-foot-6, 305 pounds) have already attracted attention from NFL scouts. 

Off the field, Bartch studied abroad in South Africa during spring 2019, where he served as a computer lab tutor for children ages kindergarten-seventh grade at Seyisi Primary School (New Brighton, South Africa). He organized and implemented daily plans to teach the children how to use computers and tutored them as they used applications for writing, reading, mathematics and learning English.

He volunteered with Catholic Charities' Meals on Wheels last fall in nearby St. Joseph and served as an after-school tutor for a sixth-grade student at All Saints Academy in St. Joseph during the 2017-18 academic year. 

At SJU, Bartch helped raise money for a pair of SJU football's initiatives, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital and Tackle Cancer. He also serves as treasurer for the Johnnies' Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC), which holds an annual Kids Fighting Hunger meal-packing event every March.

He volunteered at Newman, the Roman Catholic parish at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire's Ecumenical Religious Center, in 2017 and 2018 when visiting his grandmother during breaks in the academic year. 

In spring 2017, Bartch volunteered at the St. Joseph Community Kitchen and at the All Saints Academy's fish fry. Bartch also volunteers for the Order of Saint Benedict sisters as a cross holder and Eucharistic minister at the Sacred Heart Chapel in St. Joseph.

A psychology major, Bartch shadowed licensed psychiatrist Dr. Jon Bowar last fall at the St. Cloud Hospital's Psych Ward and resumed his visits in July.

No. 4 SJU (1-0 overall) has its bye week before hosting Gustavus Adolphus Sept. 21 for the MIAC opener and Family Weekend in Collegeville.