Softball swings for the fence
And so it begins – another season of Utah State Aggie softball.
The lady sluggers start out a new season, hoping to improve from last year’s mark of 8-40. With this season comes new life, new hopes, and new goals.
The Aggies have actually already started their season, not as well as they hoped with a record of 0-5, but four of those five games were games that could have been won.
Utah State, being blessed with layers of snow stacked up on their field, has the un-yielding task of playing an enormous amount of away games even before stepping foot on their home field. No one cares to admit it, but this could be one of the reasons that the Utah State softball team hasn’t been very good for a while.
Getting off to a good start is important and very hard, but not being able to play at home until well into April could be daunting for any team.
“We didn’t have much depth and it is hard to survive a 60-game season,” Utah State Head Coach Debbie Bilbao said of last year. “One of our pitchers quit in January and we only had two pitchers.”
“Bad attitudes,” Candice Hatch said, were their biggest problems last year – girls not getting along, and quitting halfway through the season. That is something they have tried to improve on to help them win more games, she said.
This year is going to be different though.
“This year’s team is very deep, offensively and defensively,” Bilbao said. “We’ve got four pitchers this year.
“We’ve got to go out and attack teams and win some games and make winning a habit,” she said. “We’re trying to overcome 10 years of not playing well, and that’s a hard thing to do.”
And to making winning a habit, the team has to make changes from last year. Some concerns from last year were lack of experience, and being shorthanded on the mound.
There are some returning players from last year that will bring experience to the team. Some of them are Sara Fleming, Kelly Leos, Haven Vance, Amanda Carlson, Quela Henderson, and Candice Hatch.
These were the top six hitters from last year. Hatch had an average of almost .300 and Henderson with an average of .292.
With the addition of Jessica Garnet at pitcher and two more returning pitchers, Leslie Higley and Carli Baumgartner, the Aggies have a solid starting staff.
Hopefully even after heartbreaking losses in their first tournament of the season, USU will be able to bounce back and have a good season.
“It’s pretty easy to win, but it is pretty easy to lose, too,” Bilbao said. “With experience and the expectation to win, I think we can overcome our poor start and begin to win some games.”
“The best thing we can do is take it day-to-day,” Henderson said.
-kcaustin@cc.usu.edu