Efforts for the Emporia High softball team to improve its offense this year began, literally, with its coach.
Hitting is Ray Owens’ main focus as the Spartans prepare to open their season on April 3 against Highland Park, and Owens decided that for EHS to put more runs on the board than it did last year, he needed a little coaching himself.
“The first thing we did was, (we) sent me to a hitting school,” he said. “I went through some clinics to pick out some things and stuff like that, and I brought it back. I felt like that was the one thing I needed to work on more.
“The main thing was learning how to teach the kids to hit. When I played, I was a dead right-field hitter, and was always behind the pitchers. And I don’t want everybody hitting the way I hit.”
Hitting will be especially important for Owens’ squad because two of his top pitchers, juniors Cassandra Huth and Hannah Lynch, have had some medical issues of late. Huth injured her right knee during volleyball season, had surgery and still is recovering. She’s been released by doctors to throw and soft-toss, but can’t take live batting practice or infield. Lynch recently had her appendix removed and is just recovering.
“So until we get those two recovered and see what our pitching’s gonna be like,” Owens said, “I figured, ‘Well, we’d better just work on our hitting.’ We may have to hit our way around this season.”
Improvement on last year’s 4-17 record will require Owens’ new hitting drills to bear fruit, as well as good leadership from a seven-member senior class. Key seniors include Hilary Heinrichs, who bounced between several positions last season but may get settled at shortstop this year; third baseman Maryann Bennett; first baseman Lexi Hileman; second baseman Whitney Page; outfielder Katie Weaver and catcher Lenae Wells.
“I think, first of all, it starts with defense,” Heinrichs said. “You can’t beat anybody without defense, either. So defense is gonna be really key, and we’re gonna have to work really hard. Because we can’t hide behind our pitcher the whole time. ... And she’s not always gonna strike people out. We’re gonna have to field it, too.
“But offensively — you can’t win without scoring, either. So we’re gonna have to find a way to improve on our batting, and just improve from last year. Because (there’s) nowhere to go but up.”
Last season — other than the very end of it — is one that Owens and the Spartans would like to forget for multiple reasons. Owens missed two weeks toward the end of the season, as well as the Spartans’ season-ending loss at Regionals, because of two deaths in the family. Emporia started the year 0-16 before going on a four-game winning streak heading into Regionals, where EHS lost to Shawnee Heights 14-5.
“(The losing streak) was tough, but I hope they learned a lot from it last year,” Owens said. “Because like I say, most of (them are) back now. The pitching was real young, and of course they were sophomores, and by the end of the season now, (like) you hear announcers say sometimes: by the end of the season, they’re really not sophomores anymore — they’re ready to be juniors.”
Even as the preseason focus is on run production, Owens knows the performance of Huth and Lynch in the run-prevention department will be key to how the season unfolds, saying, “This game goes as pitching goes. That’s the way it works.”
“I’ve done a lot of rehab the last couple of months to make sure I was in shape to do what I can do to help the team,” Huth said. “I’m not gonna go out and be the cleanup hitter, but I know what my position is, and I know what I need to do, and I’ve rehabbed in order to be able to do that. So I think I’ll be fine.”
Other players who could be key contributors include junior Megan Burton, sophomore Lydia Roemer and freshman Gabby Bohrer.
“We’re gonna have another big (senior) class, just like we did for basketball... and we’re more mature, I think, than we were last year, we’re a little more experienced,” Hileman said. “So I think if we play together as a team, and we focus on hitting the ball well, we’ll do just fine.”