Photos by Kyle Parmley.
Mountain Brook head coach Heather McGuirk during the Spartans’ game against Hewitt-Trussville on March 7 at Spartan Softball Field in Mountain Brook.
Spartan Softball Field has a different look than in years past.
No longer does the field, tucked neatly away in the corner of the ball fields and used for Mountain Brook High School home games, blend in with the others around it.
Investments have been made. There is a new scoreboard, a green windscreen across the outfield fence and backstop padding behind home plate. The dugouts have been widened and the indoor facility has been spruced up as well. Even the field’s lights are new.
Facility improvements are one thing. The money used to make those things happen yield concrete results. But taking the team’s performance on the field to the next level can’t be purchased.
First-year head coach Heather McGuirk’s task now is to use the positive energy created by those improvements to begin moving the program back toward its former winning ways.
“For these girls, getting to see visible changes and seeing that other people are pouring into their program gets them a little fired up,” she said. “They’re enjoying this new look. It makes them want to work that much harder.”
There are certainly challenges for the Spartans, as they field a team likely younger than almost every other that they play. Any given day, Mountain Brook could employ three to four freshmen starters.
“It is going good,” McGuirk said. “We’re making progress. We’re extremely young. We’ve had some people step into some leadership roles where they’re somewhat being forced, but we’ve made progress from day one. Every time we step on the field, we’re making more and more progress.”
Photos by Kyle Parmley.
Mary Dawson Gladney (6) throws to first.
Grace Flynn is the team’s only senior, while Turner Cole, Sara Frances Berte and Catherine Grace Couch are juniors. The rest of the team is comprised of underclassmen. That situation is tough for any team, but McGuirk has been pleased with the girls’ willingness to work toward improvement.
McGuirk preaches of creating a winning mindset and having the girls “raise the bar in a sense that we are capable of more than what has been our past.”
“Their response from day one has been incredible,” she said. “Yes they’re still teenage girls and we have those days, but in a sense of them responding to the coaching change and the transition and the higher expectations, they bust their tail every day they show up. As a coach, I can’t ask for much more than that.”
Sophomore Sarah Huddle and freshman Abby Creutzmann have split the primary pitching duties so far in 2019, with sophomores Maggie Reaves, Sarah Kate Sanders, Grace Green and freshmen Chloe Hontzas, Mary Dawson Gladney, Emily Browning and Collie Acken rounding out the roster.
Mountain Brook will wrap up the regular season in April, playing area opponents Spain Park, Hewitt-Trussville and Vestavia Hills, along with games against the likes of Homewood, Pleasant Grove, Clay-Chalkville, Chelsea and Oak Grove. The Spartans will also play in Hueytown’s tournament.
