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St. Luke's Softball: Season Preview
The St. Luke’s Softball team is a force to be reckoned with, winning back-to-back-back FAA league championships, three consecutive Western New England Titles and narrowly missing out on the FAA tournament three-peat in last year’s final to Hopkins.
With last year’s entire squad returning, Head Coach Troy Haynie is confident his players can continue the success they have enjoyed together: “The ultimate goal is to four-peat. We are the defending regular season FAA champions and defending New England Champions for the last three years and I think this group of seniors would love to achieve that goal.”
Many of the team traveled to Florida during spring break. There they had the opportunity to train and play at the ESPN Wide World of Sports complex. Haynie was thrilled with the experience: “Preseason has been excellent. There has been a lot of very high and positive energy that we are excited to see. The Disney trip was probably our best yet. The girls were flying high and worked hard and had a lot of fun.”
The team played four games in five days against Chippewa Falls High School, WI, Montclair Kimberley Academy, NJ (x2) and St. Agnes-St. Matthews school, VA. After a tough loss to Chippewa the Storm bounced back to go undefeated in the other three matchups, winning two and tying one.
This year’s squad is captained by Kristen Beaumonte ‘18, Maya Klein ‘18, Ali Ferris ‘18, Courteney Newman ‘18 and Noelle Ruschil ‘18. Haynie has been very impressed with the leadership shown by the quintet: “Noelle is injured but has been a very positive leader from the bench. Her leadership in Florida was awesome. The other captains are extremely supportive, having a lot of fun with everything we do and really helping the other players out.”
Ruschil, last year’s catcher, will, unfortunately, miss the season due to injury. Haynie is looking to fill that role. The veteran coach is confident they have the players to cope with the loss of Ruschil: “We had two seniors in Ferris and Rebecca Taylor who stepped up and caught for us in Florida and they are willing to play that role. We also have Raven Sead, who didn’t travel with us, who is also vying for that job. If our bats continue to support the runs we give up we are going to be okay.”
St. Luke’s Softball open up with a trip to Canterbury School on Wednesday, April 4 at 4:15pm followed by their home opener on Saturday, April 7 at 2:30pm.
St. Luke’s School is a secular (non-religious), private school in New Canaan, CT for grades 5 through 12 serving over 35 towns in Connecticut and New York. Our exceptional academics and diverse co-educational community foster students’ intellectual and ethical development and prepare them for top colleges. St. Luke’s Center for Leadership builds the commitment to serve and the confidence to lead.
