When the No. 2 seed Camp Verde High School and No. 1 seed Benson High School head coaches exchanged lineup cards before the Conference 2A championship game at Arizona State University on May 8, many of the names written down were not those of upperclassmen.
Camp Verde started six underclassmen all season long, while Benson’s best batter was a freshman. They are just two examples of Arizona teams that were led not by juniors and seniors with years of varsity experience under their belts, but by freshmen and sophomores who were no less experienced in high-level softball, groomed in club programs.
“It was huge. They were the difference maker,” Camp Verde head coach Henry Smith said. “When you look at like Jenna Huey and Cassandra Casillas and Naydeline [Barrada] — and some of the other freshmen that didn’t get to play were very close to starting …. Their batting averages were all high, Cassandra was our leadoff hitter, Naydeline played first base for us, all important positions.”
More often than not, high school sports teams that compete for state championships are laden with upperclassmen. 
The growing trend in Arizona high school softball is that the top programs benefit from their players playing year round with club teams. In Northern Arizona, those club teams’ rosters are nearly identical to that of the high school team. In Central and Southern Arizona, the high schools will pull from more than one team.
The fact remains the same: Players are starting from a younger age and playing together through the age group ranks, and they are now entering high school.
The result: Teams like Camp Verde, Benson or 2A quarterfinalist Trivium Preparatory Academy, which are led by underclassman-heavy lineups, are finding greater success. Trivium Prep did not qualify for the 2017 2A state tournament.
“We’ve been building these programs, this Verde Valley Heat [and] Mean Machine program, and Henry over at Camp Verde has had his Juggernauts program about the same amount of time. There are two programs over in the Prescott area that are very competitive,” said John Brown, head coach at Mingus Union High School the last six seasons and coach of Verde Valley Heat and Mean Machine. “Their programs begin to get younger and younger, so you’re going to start to see a consistency now in softball, throughout Northern Arizona anyway, where there are very competitive kids.”
Brown added that Mingus is projected to have 14 freshmen come into the program in 2019 who have already been playing year-round for three years. He said his Mean Machine team played nearly 80 games last offseason.
| Cowboys on All-Conference 2A Teams |
|
First Team Second Team Honorable Mention |
Camp Verde was led by sophomore pitcher Jacy Finley, the Central Region defensive player of the year who had 251 strikeouts, fourth most in Arizona. Thirty-two of those were in four state tournament games alone.
Finley, a First Team All-Conference 2A pick, issued 32 walks in 29 games and finished the year with a 25-4 record and 2.94 earned run average. She batted .445 with 45 RBI and 17 doubles.
The Cowboys had three freshman infielders: Huey, Casillas and Barrada. Huey had a team-best .619 batting average and 52 hits, including a team-high 19 doubles. She produced clutch hits in clutch situations. Casillas was the leadoff batter and had the second most runs scored at 37. Huey and Casillas were Second Team All-Conference 2A.
Benson freshman first baseman Emily Darwin had 17 home runs, third most in Arizona, including a two-run shot in the Bobcats’ 7-3 state title win over the Cowboys. Darwin, the 2A offensive player of the year, led Benson to a second straight championship with a team-high 70 hits, 73 RBI, 64 runs scored and 18 doubles.
Presley Williamson, freshman catcher at Trivium Prep, led the Crimson Knights in six offensive categories. Williamson was Second Team All-Conference 2A.
Coconino High School was led by sophomore Madelyn Clouse’s 20 home runs, second most in Arizona. Mingus sophomore catcher Jasmine Shults had the team’s most hits at 50. Maddie Bejarano, a Marauder in 2017 and a verbal commit to the University of Central Florida, was the Grand Canyon Region’s offensive player of the year that year. She elected not to play high school ball in 2018.
Cactus High School, the 2018 4A runner-up, was pitched to success by freshman McKenna Feringa, who posted a 1.24 ERA, a 14-2 record and 95 strikeouts. The 4A champion, Salpointe Catholic High School, had freshman pitcher Alyssa Aguilar. Aguilar struck out 141 batters and had a 1.62 ERA and a 30-4 record.
The list of teams with star underclassman players goes on.
The most competitive high school softball teams have few players who just play during the three-month spring season.
For years, due to the Arizona Interscholastic Association’s rulebook, high school coaches could not coach their players outside of the high school season. Many created club teams and had to find practice facilities outside of the school in order to work around those rules.
In the spring of 2017, the AIA abolished that rule, and coaches have had free range to work with their players.
“The ones that stand out in my program — there were five kids that made an all-region team or an all-state team — and all five of those kids were summer program kids that played year round,” Brown said. “A lot of Henry’s kids from Camp Verde, he’s done a great job with his club program and those kids play with him year round. He doesn’t have a junior varsity team, but his varsity team is very experienced, and they’re young, and they’re going to be that way for a while.”
Arizona high school softball has seen an impact from its youngest players in recent seasons.
There will be more where that came from.
