DC Softball Blogs About Beginning HCAC Play

After a not-so-great start in Florida, we came back with a lot to focus and work on, and a lot of hopes for the best.  We started our first day back with a little service project out at Diehl Park cleaning up the softball fields for the community.  The next day we packed ourselves up and headed out to Albion. Our bats slowly started coming back to life as we split with the Brits.  Then on Wednesday we traveled down to Heidelberg.  Our bats weren’t there those games as we lost both of them.  After a few days of intense practice and reflection on the season so far, we have our first home game as well as our first conference game on Sunday. We’re beyond excited to start conference play and hope that we can come through and show the team that we really are.  We’re hoping that a split of Transylvania will put us in the place we need to be in conference, since our next conference play will be against last year’s champions Anderson. Everyone should come out and support us in some great weather and with loud cheering to help us start our way onto a winning record.

Izzy, Macy, Tori

DC Softball Blogs About Spring Break in Florida

We finally started our season down at Centre College in Kentucky on our way to Florida. It was good to get our cleats on and finally be able to put on our uniforms. We left Centre with a split, and we were ready to head to Florida for some warm weather and some softball. The trip down went pretty fast, but we had a surprise when we arrived to our hotel to find that they didn’t have room for us that night. After a great tour of Orlando, we finally found a hotel and food. We started our Florida games with Washington and came up short with rocky defense, and our second game got rained out. On Monday we came up short again against Otterbein and Marietta. Monday night we ate dinner with our rooms and had a round of team putt-putt and decided we should probably all stick to the game of softball. Tuesday was our day off, and luckily, we had a beautiful day to go with family and relax with the team. Wednesday we were back on the field, lost a close one to McDaniel and pulled through with a win against Framingham State. On our last day in Florida our defense started to come together, yet our bats were still sleepy. Our pitchers showed great improvement in Florida and ended with a great performance on Thursday.

We ended the week being 2-7, which was not what we anticipated, but we did not work hard all winter at 5 a.m. for nothing. We came back ready to work hard, and we know that it is not where you start but it is where you finish. We know what we need to work on, and we know we can come out on top once we wake up our bats and play like we know how. We are excited to turn this season around and have a great season.

Lisa, Stephanie, Sara

DC Softball Blogs About the Spring Break Trip

This week started the last week of our 5 am preseason practices. Wooooooooo!!!!!!! The pressure has been put on all players by coach because we will play our first game this Friday against Centre College. Practice has been going well and everyone has been pushing each other to perform at their best out on the field and at the plate. Each position has multiple people fighting for playing time and there is a lot of internal competition. This pushes players to perform at their best and makes coaches decision that much harder for a starting line-up for the game Friday. Every day we do full defense with the whole team and we have live runners to run for us. On Wednesday it was nice outside so many players went out to the field later in the day so we could take ground balls so we could get prepared for our upcoming games. It started out rough since we are used to the turf and the wonderful hops that the ball takes but we got used to how a normal softball field is and we had a decent time with Coach Butt dancing at home plate and amusing us all.

Friday morning starts the season and we are all very pumped and some of us are nervous for this first game. We depart at 8:30 Friday morning for Kentucky and we play at 5 and 7 Friday night. After we play those games we will get back on the bus with 27 loud girls and drive rest of the way to Florida. Saturday morning we will stop early morning and practice at a local high school in Florida and then we will continue on our way to Orlando. We play 2 games Sunday, 2 games Monday, we get to have Tuesday off to spend with our families if we would like, varsity plays 2 games on Wednesday and JV plays one game, and then we play 2 games Thursday and then head back to wonderful Defiance College afterwards.

Our spring break trip will set the tone for the rest of our season and we cannot wait to get out on the field and spend time with the people that are closest to us. We feel as though it is going to be a very good season for the DC softball team and we are ready for all of the challenges ahead. We believe that “To be the best you have to believe you are the best”. We believe we are the best and we will prove that this next week.

Much love,
Tori Plummer, Brittany Shough, Morgan Williamson

DC Softball Talks About the End of Preseason

The anticipation is growing as we get closer to Florida and the end of 5 a.m. practices. Practice has been going well, and we all have been working hard towards our first game on March 9^th against Centre College. This will kick off our journey to the HCAC Tournament. We all love being in the field house. We are able to do team defenses and we are able to practice plays. Everyone’s intensity is high and attitudes are great throughout practices.

This past Friday was the official Ribbon Cutting Ceremony for the George M. Smart Athletic Center. The official opening of “The George” was a big event because all of the sports teams attended. We are happy to have a new place to practice during the season, even if this means running endless miles on the new track. This past weekend we hosted our first official Prospect Camp. This camp was set up for future teammates to work with the Defiance College team and with our coaching staff. Overall, the camp went very well and we had a lot of fun meeting and working with our potential teammates.

This Wednesday SAAC hosted a Student-Athlete Wellness Night. At this event, a motivational speaker came to discuss the importance in Division III Athletics and mental toughness. Other offerings of the event were massages, Zumba and Yoga. They also provided healthy food to eat. We are looking forward to the season starting and the warm Florida weather!