By Joshua Koch
Public Communications
As Atascocita softball coach Ashley Boyd walked around the team’s annual summer camp on Tuesday morning, camp participants would come up to her with different questions.
Some about the camp, but also many about former Atascocita players Kasidi Pickering and Katie Cimusz.
“When were they here? What positions did they play?”, Boyd would be asked.
The buzz was apparent around the field for camp around the former Eagles stars who now star for No. 2 Oklahoma and No. 1 Texas softball, respectively, which will face off on Wednesday night in Game 1 of the Women's College World Series Championship Finals on ESPN.
“It’s something they can see and know we can play here and be from this area and go on to do those types of things,” Boyd said of the campers who recorded a video on Monday wishing Kasidi and Katie luck. “It’s a light bulb moment of them watching their future selves and that can happen. It’s really neat to see.”
“I don’t know that they can all appreciate what it means to be playing at Texas or OU and playing in a National Championship but they can understand that that kid was me one day. She’s from here. I think that’s a really cool thing to see.”
Boyd, who played at Oklahoma State, in her senior year in 2011 made it to the Women's College World Series with the Cowgirls.
Getting to Oklahoma City is the goal for every player who steps onto a college softball diamond. On Saturday, Boyd traveled there to watch Cimusz and the Longhorns play Florida and Pickering and the Sooners play UCLA.
“The growth of the game is insane,” Boyd said. “Back when I played, there wasn’t that second tier of the stadium. I’m 90% sure the grandstands are bigger. Just look at ticket prices. The demand for the game and what these girls can do and the appreciation for how hard they play the game, it’s there now.”
As a freshman, Pickering has solidified her spot in the Sooners starting lineup.
In the elimination game against Florida on Tuesday, she went 2 for 3 at the play with a double and a walk. For the season, Pickering has started in 62 of the Sooners 64 games, hit .387 at the plate with nine doubles, one triple, 10 homers and driven in 48 runs for the back-to-back-to-back National Champions.
“She’s been a powerhouse for them,” Boyd said. “She lives for those big moments – to make the big play or to have the big at-bat. She just lives for it. She works so hard, it’s fun to her, it’s a game for her. She doesn’t feel the pressure.”
At Texas, Cimusz’s role has changed this season compared to others and she has risen to the occasion.
This year, Cimusz has played more of a spot role for the Longhorns, getting called on to pinch-hit in high-pressure situations – like on Saturday against Florida coming up with an RBI single to cap a 10-0 run-rule victory over the Gators – while also starting 14 games.
“Just her IQ of the game and knowing what her job is is second to none,” Boyd said. “Katie has phenomenal stats and does her job. That’s why they keep calling her name and her number in those big moments.”
For the season, Cimusz, who was a part of the 2018 Atascocita High School Class 6A State Championship team, has played in 39 games for Texas batting .304 at the dish with three doubles, three homers and 15 RBIs.
Now, Cimusz and Pickering, who were teammates at Atascocita for two seasons, will face off in the biggest series of their college softball careers. And it comes on a national stage.
“It just makes me proud,” Boyd said. “What they’re doing, so few people actually get to do it. Just to know the kind of people that they are and the work that they put in back when nobody knew who they were and see it come to fruition. I hate we have two playing against each other but I couldn’t be more proud of the work they’ve put in and the process they’ve bought into.”
Boyd’s biggest takeaway from watching her two former players is the great examples they are to the next generation of players.
There is a reason why they are brought up and talked about at the Atascocita softball summer camp. Not just because they play for Oklahoma and Texas or are in the National Championship game.
But because they are role models on how to play the game right for the girls who will one day potentially fill their shoes at Atascocita and beyond.
“They’re such good people,” Boyd said. “If you want the definition of hard worker, go look at those two. You want the definition of good teammates, go look at those two. You want the definition of selfless, it’s them. They’re good examples. You don’t have to know them to be able to watch them from a distance and appreciate those things about them because it’s obvious.”