Fatima senior Kinzey Woody played third base for the Impact Caymol Premier 18U traveling softball team that finished tied for third at last week’s Premier Girls Fastpitch (PGF) national championship tournament in Huntington Beach, Calif.

“This was a great experience,” said Woody, who played the hot corner because the team’s shortstop is competing this year at Clemson University. “That’s her main position, so I’ll let her have that all day.”

She joined the team last summer when the 16U ladies finished tied for seventh at nationals. This year, she was hopeful the team would crack the top spot, but the team fell 2-0 to the eventual second-place team.

“We would have had to beat the same team twice, and we ended up losing,” said Woody, who hit about .440 on the season with 12 home runs, including seven at the June 13-16 tournament in Kansas City, where the team finished first, nine doubles and 61 RBI. “Their pitcher is a Texas commit, so she’s pretty good. The pitcher for the team that won is going to the University of Florida. There was a lot of pretty good competition, that’s for sure.”

Overall, the team had a 35-6 record. Woody explained that only the top two teams compete for the national title; the following two teams tie for third.

“We really expected to win it all, but one of our main pitchers went down and couldn’t throw hardly at all this summer,” said Woody. “So, we relied on one pitcher to carry us through. She threw 61 innings last week for us, which is a lot. So, at the beginning of the season, we had high expectations. We got to the PGF and lost our second bracket game, which knocked us to the loser’s bracket. Once you get there, it’s tough. You have to fight your way out, and we played excellent teams. To make it as far as we did was amazing; there’s just no other word to describe it. I think, more than anything, we’re all sad that it’s over. They’re all leaving for college, but we just weren’t ready for it to be over with.”

The team competed in several tournaments over the summer before entering the national competition. After a fifth-place finish in Florida from June 6-9, the team emerged champions among 65 teams in Kansas City. Next was a tournament in Colorado from July 1-7, with a second-place finish, followed by a competition in Georgia and then the national tournament.

Prior to the start of the season, the team met just outside Atlanta, Ga., for a four-day spring training ahead of the Florida tournament. “It’s dedication on the kids’ part for hitting and pitching,” said Kinzey’s father, Chuck Woody, who has helped coach in the past. “They worked for four days together as a team on situational awareness and how they would handle various scenarios.”

After that, each player had to maintain a consistent regimen, from staying in shape to improving hitting and fielding. The team included players from Missouri, New York, Georgia, North Carolina, Alabama, Arizona, Tennessee, Ohio, Florida, and Virginia, among other states.

Each was responsible for making it to tournaments, which required a commitment from parents as well. Woody said she’s grateful for her family’s support.

Woody is eligible to play one more year at the 18U level and plans to rejoin her team next summer. However, she said that all but four players are moving on to college, so it will be a new group for the most part. “I think we’re still gonna be really good,” she said. “We’re supposed to be getting a bunch of good players coming in.”

Woody has plenty of high-level softball experience. In 2018, she and former teammate Mia Kliethermes, who has committed to playing for the University of Pittsburgh Lady Panthers, played together on the Missouri Stealth 12U-B team, which tied for ninth in the Midwest national tournament.

The pair played ball together since before they started kindergarten, moving up through t-ball and coach pitch and then traveling ball before joining the Stealth team in 2018.

In the national tournament that year, Kliethermes pitched one complete game, racking up nine strikeouts on the way to the low to mid-50s from the rubber.

Woody, meanwhile, had a solid tourney at the plate, finishing with a .550 BA and holding her own at shortstop. She is looking forward to Fatima’s upcoming fall season.

Admittedly, however, there’s a big difference between traveling softball and what Woody will play this fall with the Lady Comets.

“On the travel team, we’re all going to play in college, and in high school, there’s a few of us that are gonna go play, but it’s not every single person,” Woody explained. “So, when you travel ball, all of my teammates, you know, we’re all thinking the same thing as we’re playing. In this situation, I know what my teammate’s going to do. It’s not like we need to tell each other how to do things; we just know how to do it. In high school ball, they may or may not think the same way. I think travel ball helped me be a really good leader and help my teammates. Leadership is a big piece for high school ball.”

Woody added that the mechanics she works hard to perfect in the summer will be complimentary to her role at Fatima under Coach Ashlee Schnieders. “In travel ball, you’re held to such a high standard because, in every game, we’re playing against girls that are going to go to a power five school or something. I hold myself to that high standard in high school ball; I can have an off-game here or there, and I’ll be fine. But in summer ball, if I have an off game, that could be the difference between us scoring a run and winning the game or losing. I don’t think about that much. I just go out and do my best every day.”