After beginning the season with a 3-1 stretch Kentucky against Bellarmine and Northern Kentucky, the softball team went to Florida and went 9-3 over six days. Since returning, the Eagles have pushed their record to 21-5.

Last week, they won five of six games in three double-headers against Northwood, Saginaw Valley State and Lake Superior State.

According to junior first baseman Franki Gironda and senior third baseman Alyssa Kelley, the success has been due in large part to the team’s camaraderie.

“In my four years here, we’ve never had a group that is this close to being best friends,” Kelley said. “I mean, we just have never have gotten along this well before, and I think that’s showing on the field.”

Gironda agreed, stressing the importance of how important togetherness is in a sport where almost 30 games are played during the first month of the season.

“If we don’t have that team chemistry and that comfortableness with the entire team, it makes for some really long bus trips and some really tough games,” she said.

Kelley has had an especially hot start to the season, batting .453 with 10 doubles and 16 RBI with only three strikeouts. She was named Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Player of the Week after leading the team in batting average (.593), slugging percentage (.741) and on-base percentage (.633) in eight games last week.

She also drove in the winning run during the 10th inning of a 3-2 win over Saginaw Valley State.

“I didn’t even think about it until one of my friends mentioned that it was a possibility,” Kelley said. “I was just more excited about how well we did as a team this week.”

Ashland began GLIAC play by splitting against Northwood (11-2, 2-5), winning both games against Saginaw Valley State (3-2, 5-4) and twice against Lake Superior State (8-0, 6-4).

The first game against SVSU and the last game against LSSU – both of which the Eagles won – went into extra innings. Gironda attributed the extra-inning success to the team’s ability to relax in big moments.

“Last year, we would put pressure on ourselves to produce, especially offensively,” she said. “This year, we’re not putting that pressure on ourselves.”

The Eagles continued play yesterday with a double-header against Tiffin and will travel to Findlay for four games this weekend.