Sultan High School’s softball team got its first glimpse of success under head coach Garth MacDicken three years ago when it fell one victory short of advancing to the 2A District 1 tournament.
At the time, the freshman trio of Courtney Morris, Rachel Kirkpatrick and Randi Tuggle set a goal of getting to the state tournament before they graduated — something that had never been done by a Sultan fastpitch team.
The next season the Turks regressed, winning just two games. They improved last spring, but still failed to make the district tournament.
This year, in their final chance, Morris, Kirkpatrick and Tuggle achieved their goal of making state when Sultan defeated Lakewood 4-3 in extra innings during the district semifinals on May 21.
“They’ve talked about (getting to state) since the first day of practice,” MacDicken said. “They knew if they could find the right chemistry, then they could find their way to state.”
MacDicken has been with the Turks’ softball program for seven years, the past five as head coach. Knowing that the current group was on its way helped convince him to take the head job.
“I knew there was a bunch of girls that had played softball together for a long time,” he said. “I remember that being one of my thought processes when I was first asked to apply for the job was, ‘There’s a group of girls that have been playing softball together for a long time and I’d really like to be a part of it.’”
The Turks opened the season by winning four of their first five games. Their only loss was to eventual Cascade Conference champion Granite Falls, which lost just two games all season. The Turks led the game 2-0 before eventually losing 4-2.
That’s the only time the Turks (17-5) have lost by more than one run this season.
“That Granite (Falls) game, I guess you could say is kind of a moment that they saw they can compete with anybody,” MacDicken said of his players.
One area where the Turks have shown significant improvement this spring is in their ability to bounce back from adversity.
“The past few years, mistakes are one of the biggest things that hurt us,” Tuggle said. “If we make a mistake, we’ve always kind of let it snowball on us. If we made a mistake, we didn’t pick each other up, but this year it’s definitely been different. We’ve picked each other up really well and we’ve flushed every mistake that we’ve made and kept going.”
After losing to Granite Falls, the Turks lost two of their next five games to drop to third in the league standings.
With MacDicken imploring his team to focus only on the next game, the Turks turned things around, winning 10 of their last 11 regular-season contests. Sultan’s only defeat in that run was to Granite Falls, but the Turks also handed the Tigers their lone conference loss during that same stretch.
Their success carried over into the postseason. The Turks won their district opener over Sedro-Woolley to set up the winner-to-state game against Lakewood. Tuggle scored the winning run on a Bethany Kirkpatrick double, setting off a long-awaited celebration.
“That moment she slid in, the girls just went nuts,” MacDicken said. “There were parents crying. I looked back at my (athletic director) and my AD had tears coming down his cheeks. It was such an emotional time. The girls have wanted it so bad. Almost the entire team was crying for like five minutes. It was a great moment.”
MacDicken’s three seniors have been a big part of the turnaround, but so has sophomore pitcher Shelby Jeffries.
Jeffries has been dominant from the pitching circle, with a sub-1.00 earned-run average and 173 strikeouts. She’s just as dangerous at the plate, leading the team in home runs and triples.
“Even the girls that are older than her look up to her,” MacDicken said. “Her work ethic is second to none.”
Jeffries’ is a quiet leader, but her teammates take notice and don’t mind following in the footsteps of a younger player.
“I think she gives us confidence,” Kirkpatrick said. “She comes out here and works after practice and works her butt off. That shows us that we can do it too.”
Even though she’s young, the pressure of a state tournament is not likely to affect Jeffries.
“I’ve played select since I was 10 years old, so high-pressure situations are something that I’ve grown up doing,” she said. “You feel (the pressure) a little bit, but it’s something that I’ve been trained to feel. I love the pressure situations — I really do.”
Jeffries and the Turks face Othello at 10 a.m. today at Carlon Park in Selah in the opening round of the 2A state tournament.
“We can do some special things here,” Jeffries said. “As long as we play as a team and work together, we have a chance.”
Aaron Lommers covers prep sports for The Herald. Follow him on Twitter at @aaronlommers and contact him at alommers@heraldnet.com.
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