Softball season earns incomplete grade

Amanda Parsons has a sweet memory of her final at-bat of the college softball season, albeit 36 games short.

Parsons, a junior catcher for Concordia University, St. Paul, clocked a three-run homer in a 12-2 victory over Mercyhurst in Florida on March 6.

Nobody knew at the time that would be the final game of the season due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Parsons, a 2017 Grafton High School graduate and two-time North Shore Conference Player of the Year, was enjoying early success through the first 19 games of the year. She was hitting a personal-high .321 — fourth on the team — with two home runs, two doubles and 10 RBI.

“I give lots of credit to our new hitting coach as he has really helped me.  My swing and the way I approach each at-bat is much more consistent. I’ve tried to attack a little earlier in the count, which has helped,” Parsons said.

Coach Bob Bartel said Parsons has improved every year since she stepped onto campus and last year considered her the best defensive catcher in the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference. She led the NSIC with 15 runners thrown out and had a .997 fielding percentage with just one error.

“She has worked hard at trying to get better in all phases,” he said.

Beyond that, Bartel said Parsons’ “energy and passion for the game rubs off” on everyone.

Parsons tallied her first career triple this season. She hit the ball to the right-center gap and trotted into third standing up. A teammate knocked her home right after that.

“She has added speed to her game,” Bartel said. “I’m not afraid to steal her in the right situation.”

Those situations won’t arise until next season.

After the Golden Bears got back from Florida, they had a normal week of classes and practices until learning on March 12 that the conference was suspending spring sports. The next day, Bartel told the team the conference canceled the spring season.

“It was really emotional, especially for our seniors,” Parsons said.

“It was helpful that we were all together for this. We all hung around together that night. You work as a team from fall on, and then play 50-plus games a year and all that goes into it, you become really close.”

The team went 7-3 on the Florida road trip over spring break and Parsons said it was starting to hit its stride.

Now, Parsons is staying at a teammate’s parents’ home and attending school online. She plans to come back to Grafton in the next few weeks.

“I really miss the team atmosphere and miss the games for sure. It was an odd way for the season to end, and the school year with being online the rest of the semester,” she said.

Parsons is majoring in business management. She is on the dean’s list and made the NSIC All-Academic team last year.

She has an internship this summer, does all the social media posts for the softball team and has created videos of other sports for Concordia’s athletic department.

The altered semester doesn’t affect Parsons’ plans to graduate next spring but, because the season was cut so short the NCAA is offering players to come back for a fifth season.

“I will have a decision to make about playing a fifth year,” Parsons said.

In the meantime, she said she looks forward to life getting back to normal, “or something close to that.”

“I feel awful for so many that are directly affected and don’t have family or friends support,” she said. “I feel fortunate for what I have.”