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Thursday, May 1, 2008
Lone Senior
Western Arkansas, AR
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By: Bennett Horne
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Photo(s) By: Bennett Horne
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Harrison's Mallory Young bounces back strong after injury
Returning from a knee injury isn’t the only successful comeback Mallory Young is pulling off this season.
Harrison’s lone senior is hitting .400 and playing error-free defense in right field for the Lady Goblins, who won 13 of their first 18 games to start the season.
After battling back from surgery in August for a dislocated kneecap, Young has taken it upon herself to lead a softball resurgence at Harrison, the results of which have the Lady Goblins in the thick of the 5A-West race and an odds-on favorite for a berth in the state tournament.
This after going 30-63 over the previous three years and 14-26 since losing in the first round of the 2005 state tournament.
Chuck Eddington, in his sixth season as Harrison’s coach, said the team has been following the lead of Young, a four-year starter at second base and now right field.
“All the other players look to her because they know she’s got the experience,” he said. “When things are going bad she’s the one that tries to get everybody focused. She’s good about telling them, ‘Good job,’ and is just a real good senior to have on the team. She’s always been real coachable. She listens and then tries to do exactly what you’ve asked her to do.”
This season the team has recorded several firsts under Eddington: a tournament championship, a sweep of perennial league favorite Greenbrier and a double-digit (10) winning streak.
Eddington attributes most of the success to Young’s example. Young, who likes to organize various team get-togethers, says it’s because the players just like being together.
“Before we would never hang out after practice like we do this year,” she said. “We started hanging out in offseason so we could become closer than what we were and we’ve become friends. Some of us didn’t really ever talk, but now we’ve become really good friends. Now it’s like we’ve become one big family and we’re playing together as a team more than we have.”
In 2000 the Lady Goblins were state runners-up. Consecutive semifinal appearances followed before the program fell on hard times.
Now Young, the only player on the roster with postseason experience, is fighting to get Harrison back into the state tournament,
“She got a little taste of it,” said Eddington, “and she’s been telling the others that she wants to go back her last year. The other girls respect her so much that they’re working hard to try to get that for her. I really think they’re making it personal for her.”
The same way she made it personal for her team.
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