After hiatus, ODA softball progress starts to pay dividends

The chant came from the Out-of-Door Academy dugout on March 24, drowning out the background noise from a track and field meet being contest a few feet away from the school's softball diamond.

“We all feel special .., We all feel great ... We’re all going to step on ... (clap) ... home plate!”

The softball diamond would still be a silent area if not for the actions of two girls who simply wanted to play the game.

Bella Lee-Swartz came to ODA for the 2013-14 school year specifically to play on its softball team. Unfortunately, that year there was no ODA softball. The year before had seen six seniors graduate, and there were not enough players at ODA interested in softball to field a team. It likely would have remained that way for a long time.

Lee-Swartz was not having any of it.

She teamed with Kiarra Womack, also a sophomore at the time, and together the pair went on a campaign to restart the program. They had meetings with ODA’s Head of School, David Mahler. They pitched the idea to other students at Ovations — ODA’s version of assemblies. Eventually, with enough persistence, Lee-Swartz and Womack rounded up enough girls to fill out a lineup card, and the sport returned in 2015.

Bringing a program back from the dead is one thing. Making it successful is another. That initial season back, the program went winless.

Current head coach Julianne Garcia was not at ODA for its first year back. She joined the school last year as an assistant. Garcia has loved and played the sport all her life, including collegiately at the University of St. Francis. This was not a case of someone being asked into a job. In fact, Garcia said she went to the administration and told them she wanted to help.

Unfortunately for ODA, the softball program went winless again in the 2016 season, playing a shortened six-game schedule. Garcia, who was promoted to head coach before this season, said the team was lucky to get 10 players to show up at any given game in 2016. Lee-Swartz and Womack continue to recruit their fellow students to be players in the face of a sheer uphill climb.

“We wanted to create a new family,” Womack said of putting together a softball team. “We want people to stick with this for a long time. It has been a nice bonding experience.”

Garcia was fine stepping into a tough situation. Of course, that doesn't mean she is willing to accept a lack of success.

“We want results and we want them right now,” Garcia said, “But we are growing. We want to learn. We are hungry to learn. Every game, I see improvement. The experienced players are helping the inexperienced ones.”

This season started much the same as the previous two, though 18 players now fill the roster. The Thunder lost its first four games by a combined score of 81-34. Then, on March 7, they finally won, beating Imagine North Port 28-3.

Lee-Swartz and Womack, now seniors, were able to walk off the field winners for the first time. They said the win helped bring the team together and started to generate respect.

The win, however, was not a panacea. Three consecutive losses followed, all by double-digits. On March 24, though, the day when the team’s chants rang loud, ODA picked up its second win, 23-11 over Foundation Christian Academy that was capped by junior Christina Lutton’s grand slam. The team was so stunned by the big hit that only a few players greeted Lutton on the field. The rest waited in the dugout, arms in the air for a high five, while processing the event.

After the win, in the handshake line, everyone had ear-length smiles, Garcia included. She was most happy for her senior captains, Lee-Swartz and Womack. It would have been hard to see those two leave ODA without a victory, Garcia said, after putting so much into the program for so few on-field rewards.

The program is still staring down a long road, but she will continue to revel in the small victories, like the team learning how to position itself in the outfield, which Garcia said it could not do at the beginning of the year. Every once in a while, there will be bigger victories, like the literal one against FCA.

Throughout all the peaks and valleys of building a program from essentially the ground up, Garcia will be there for the Thunder for as long as students want to play softball.

“Of course we have goals, but if I always have a new group, the goal is to teach them. If we are not winning, I am OK as long as the girls are improving.”