Karen Boehler
CCSR writer/editor
DEXTER — The Dexter softball team has a dream.
The team graduated only one player off last year’s state-tournament team — they entered as the 16th seed and surprised some people by sticking around through four games — and with five seniors and big numbers, the Demons are thinking positive.
“I think our whole team is just going to shine this year,” said coach Heather Amaro. “We’ve been working so hard. It’s fun to come to practice every day. We’ve got a good group of kids. Real good group of kids. They have a dream in mind and I just hope they keep it there and we see success this year.”
In her fifth year as head coach, Amaro is exited to shepherd her seniors through their last year with her.
“Every girl is special to me, but it’s the group I started with,” she said. “They were my babies. My eighth-grade babies. A lot of them had never played. It’s kind of come full circle now. It’s kind of a fun year, for me, too.”
Add in a mix of freshman, sophomores and juniors — and with 18 players, the team has enough girls for a full JV squad — and Amaro expects the team to be solid across the board.
Amaro is looking for good things on the mound, led by junior Jenna Garcia and sophomore Taylor Miles.
“We’re developing some younger girls, so we’re trying to get better at that,” she said. “Pitching is hard to come by. You’ve got to have that drive. Our pitching staff is pretty young, so I’m excited about that.”
While hits were in short supply last season, the coach said the team has worked hard, and expects to see that stat pick up.
“Our hitting really come a long way last year,” she said. “We had a really strong off-season program, and I’ve already seen that strength come out. I’m hoping to see some good things at the plate as well.”
Defense is always one of the last things to come together on high school squads, and Amaro said weather and basketball has made it impossible to scrimmage. But she’s still confident that part of the game will come together as well.
“I’m looking forward to our defense. We should be pretty solid because we don’t have a lot of holes to fill,” she said. “It’s still so early to tell, and I haven’t been out as much as I’d like because of the weather. But we’ve been working hard and they’ve been putting in some extra time. We’ve been staying until past dark. We’ve got our lights now so we can do that,” she said.
The Demons will get their first chance to see how everything comes together Tuesday vs. the Artesia junior varsity in Artesia. They’ll host Loving, then travel to Estancia before hosting the sixth annual Lindsey Callaway Tournament.
“Our tournament is always pretty stout,” Amaro said. “We’ve got Hope Christian coming back, and they’re always a AAA contender. Jal and Loving, they’re always (strong.) Loving hardly lost anyone this year.”
Add in Eunice, the AAAAA Carlsbad “C” team, Ruidoso, Loving and Capitan, and the tournament should get Dexter ready for district, which, with Portales, Lovington and Ruidoso, is always tough.
“Portales is always a state contender and their pitching is always real strong,” Amaro said. “We try to do what we can to prepare for district. It’s tough going into that AAA district. This will be the last year we’re playing AAA, but we always hold our own, or we have in the last couple of years.”
But the coach is stressing that what happened last year doesn’t matter.
“I’ve really tried to emphasize to my team that it’s a new year,” she said. “We learned a lot last year, and I’ve tried to teach them that that’s a stepping stone and to bring what we learned from last year into this year because this is a new team. Even though we only lost one (player) it’s still a new year. It’s a new team. We have different goals we try to set each and every year and try to build on from year to year.”
So what are those goals?
“Every team’s dream is to win state, but we’ve tried to sit down and discuss that, and it takes a lot to get there,” Amaro said. “You’ve got to take one day at a time and take care of business one day at a time. It’s easy to say, ‘Oh, we want to make it to state,’ but we’ve really tried to help understand that we have to take care of business to get there.”
For more sports news, go to Chaves County Sports Report