UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – The Nittany Lion Softball team started its season, but has yet to grace the Nittany Lion Softball Park. The players have played tournaments in both Florida and North Carolina so far this year, and are heading back to Florida for the Knights Classic at UCF on Saturday.
With so much time on the road, the returning players from last year's team get a great chance to bond with the eight freshmen who have just started their Penn State careers.
Freshman pitcher Bailey Parshall, who already has 29.2 innings under her belt this season, noted the impact that the time away from home has on the team's chemistry.
"Being a freshman and not knowing any of the upperclassmen," she said. "In the beginning of the year it was hard to approach them, but now we're able to connect with them more."
Head coach Amanda Lehotak believes that the team has really taken advantage of the opportunity.
"It's a really close-knit group," she said. "Usually you have cliques, but not this group. They're in it for one another."
Senior outfielder Tori Dubois, who currently boasts a team high .407 batting average echoed Lehotak's beliefs.
"I think overall that our team chemistry is the best it's been in years," Dubois said. "We have a lot of time to learn more about each other and I think that's a key to success.
In the Nittany Lions' first two tournaments, they have played five games over a three-day span and four games over a three-day span. Playing so much after the long offseason, nobody expects the team to be at it's peak, but these tournaments provide learning opportunities for both the upperclassmen and newcomers.
Dubois thinks that this freshmen class have already done a great job learning from these games.
"I think the game at the college level is a lot faster," she said on the differences they may be seeing. "But I think our freshmen have been one of our fasters classes we've ever had and they've really responded to the challenge."
There might be no better example of that than Parshall, who reinforced Dubois in saying she has absorbed a lot in this short span of time.
"It's pretty taxing having that many games in a row, but if a game doesn't go how you want, you have to go on to the next game and not go back and dwell on it," Parshall said. "Pitching wise, I can't regret what I did, I made a mistake but I know that the infield will be there to support me."
With the players refusing to complain and using this as a learning opportunity, Lehotak thinks it's important to have this happen early in the season.
"I think it only makes us better and I think it only makes us mentally tougher moving forward."
The team has already noticed improvements with the season just beginning, but both the players and coaches know that they're not in prime form just yet.
"This team continually gets better every week," Lehotak said. "It's just little things here and there, but they continuously get better and better. They're working as hard today as they did in September."
Dubois added on by summing up the team's thoughts for this season.
"This year we're set on our goal and nobody is going to stop us until we reach it."
The Nittany Lions still have some time on the road as their next 16 games will be played in Florida before they return to Penn State on Mar. 20 to face Robert Morris in the home opener.
