West Seattle comes into the 2015 softball season with high expectations -- like winning the 3A state championship. All but one player returns from the team that fell one game short of qualifying last season.
Trevor Leopold has big plans for the West Seattle softball team this season.
“We are looking not only to go to state this season, but win it,” the second-year coach said.
That’s a pretty bold statement for a guy who took over a struggling program last season with exactly zero experience as a softball coach. But he believes the Wildcats can back it up after finishing one win away from last year’s state tournament with a squad that included no seniors.
West Seattle did lose one outfielder, who moved, but picked up senior shortstop Charli Elliott, who didn’t turn out last season. Elliott hit a game-winning three-run home run in Tuesday’s 6-3 victory over Emerald Ridge of Puyallup. Her return allows senior Annalisa Ursino to move back to the outfield, her more natural position.
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And the Wildcats feature one of the league’s top pitchers in junior Gabby Wenn, who has committed to Villanova.
Leopold coached high-school football and powerlifting in Wisconsin before moving to the area and becoming athletic director at West Seattle last year. When the new softball coach he hired resigned three days before the start of the season to accept another position, Leopold decided to step in.
“I just went to the first (team) meeting and said, ‘I’ve never had a losing record on any team I’ve been on, and we’re going to win,’” he said.
The Wildcats did just that, sharing the Metro Sound Division title with Nathan Hale and finishing 16-8 overall after a 4-5 start.
Leopold set up a challenge nonleague schedule this spring that includes five opponents that were state qualifiers last year and the Wildcats have started 4-1, including a 3-0 victory over Bethel, which placed fourth in last year’s 4A state tournament. The lone loss was 5-4 to Mountain View of Vancouver, which went 1-2 at last year’s 3A state tourney.