Oct. 23, 2012
SAN DIEGO -
COACH VAN WYK QUOTES | PRESS CONFERENCE
San Diego State Softball Press Conference
Fowler Athletic Center
October 23, 2012
Head Coach Kathy Van Wyk
Opening statement:
"We're wrapping up our fall season. (Friday night against the NPF All-Stars) is the last competition we'll have for the fall and obviously they will be the toughest competition we'll face all year. They are coming in here with four Olympians on the team, including Kelly Kretschman, Caitlin Lowe, Andrea Duran and Jenn Salling, who was an Olympian from the Canadian team. It will be a good fight but I think we'll give them everything we got. It's a great way to test ourselves heading into the spring season.
"I say this all the time, but we are getting better and better every year. We've got more talent than we've ever had before. We're excited to be coming off another good season last year."
On keeping a top-25 team going every year:
"It's a constant recruiting battle. We've got to win the battles against the some of the Pac-12 and SEC programs. There's such an aura going around with playing at a Pac-12 school. We've just got to keep going after those players and show them that we can compete with any of those programs out there. We've been beating the bottom half of the Pac-12 for a very long time and we're getting closer and closer every year to the top half. I think competition wise we are right there with them. We just have to win some of those recruiting battles and keep getting better talent to compete with them on the field."
On what she likes about this team:
"We've got some great returners coming back. Hayley Miles came off an otherworldly year last season. She batted .429 with 20 home runs in the leadoff spot, which is nice. And we had her in the leadoff spot because I thought we had plenty of people who could hit for power in the 3-4-5 hole. She's going to have a lot of expectations placed on her this year, but she's up to the challenge and I'm looking forward to another great year from her.
"Rebecca Arbino has looked superior all fall. She's worked very hard this summer to perfect her spins, her curve and her riseball. She's got the speed to hold teams down. We're real excited about those two returners coming back.
"We've got some work to do defensively. We've got to replace some people. We've got some newcomers, who I think if they can get through the freshman jitters and settle down, they're going to be really good. We have some local kids, one of them Monica Downey, who is going to play shortstop for us and looks very, very good for us defensively.
"We're still shoring up everybody up and down the lineup, but we've got some great returners coming back."
On the importance of the fall season:
"It's very important. This is where we have the time to break things down and work on hitting and pitching techniques, doing some drills and working on team defenses and things we need to shore up prior to going into the season. We've got less than a month before our first competition once we start in January. We play Arizona right out of the gates in the first five games. There are no breaks to start the season. Every game is important."
On replacing graduating pitcher Bailey Micetich:
"That's a good question. Do you have any ideas? No, we have four very good pitchers on the roster this year. Bailey was solid and ate up a lot of innings. We have a freshman coming in - Danielle O'Toole - who is a lefty, which adds another very interesting aspect for us. You don't see a whole lot of lefties, but when you do they are tough to hit. They have very different movement on the ball. She's going to go through her freshman jitters and all that good stuff, but I think she's got a lot of ability. She's tall and lanky and has the kind of pitching body you'd like to have. She's going to eat up a lot of innings for us behind Rebecca Arbino.
"And Lorena Bauer (formerly Klopp) is back and healthy. We expect her to do some pitching this year. She throws harder than any one of (our other pitchers). She throws between 65 and 70 miles per hour, but Lorena's ball is straighter than most. Once they catch up to it, they're going to hit her, but she's going to eat up some good innings for us.
"Kamerin May is still on the roster with us and she'll do the same. She'll try to keep the (other pitchers) from getting too tired and eat innings for us as well."