A Game of Their Own by Jennifer Ring

Author:Jennifer Ring [Ring, Jennifer]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: SPO003030 Sports & Recreation / Baseball / History
ISBN: 9780803269941
Publisher: University of Nebraska Press
Published: 2015-01-25T16:00:00+00:00

Fig. 19. Jenna Marston, a later at bat, Team USA 2010. Courtesy of USA Baseball.

Fig. 20. Jenna Marston, Team USA 2010, USA Baseball Sportswoman of the Year. Courtesy of Brian Fleming.

Although she is remarkably even-keeled and tries to keep herself that way, she admits to a few highs and lows. One great moment in softball came when, as a freshman at Missouri, she hit a walk-off home run against rival Kansas (KU). “KU is our school rival, and we just don’t want to lose to them. So getting that one was pretty cool. The other one was last year when we won the Big 12 championship at home. Knowing that we would at least be tied for a championship, that was a pretty exciting moment too.”

Her favorite baseball memories are playing with her brother when she was a freshman and he was a senior in high school. Only one baseball moment in her life was particularly disappointing: in her final at bat in the first game against Venezuela at the 2010 Women’s World Cup, she struck out, swinging on a pitch that was over her head. But she recalls even that with a balanced perspective: “I don’t know if I would say I was nervous, but it was definitely a different feeling than I’ve felt before. When I can play calm, that’s when I’m the most comfortable. So when you’re playing in front of that [Venezuelan] crowd, and they have the Battle of the Bands going on in the stadium, it was kind of hard to stay calm and everything. My last at bat, when I struck out on a pitch over my head, I would say it was because of the crowd. I wasn’t focused in enough, and I remember that specifically. It wasn’t even close. Who knows why I was swinging at it, except that the crowd was affecting me. It was kind of that anxious feeling, I guess.”

The WCWS is the biggest event in women’s college softball, but when Mizzou plays in that stellar venue, Jenna is able to tune out the noise of the crowd. She found the WCWS crowd less unnerving than that at the 2010 Women’s World Cup because the college softball crowd is less partisan and less noisy. “We’re always really excited to go, but once you start playing, you don’t really notice that it’s any different. You kind of zone in. The crowd there isn’t really biased or anything. Yes, one team will have their section of fans, and the other will have theirs, but then the rest of the people are really just softball fans or little girls that just want to come watch you play. So they just cheer for everybody or nobody. It’s different.”

It was Jenna’s play as a freshman during Missouri’s regular season game against Texas A&M that brought her to the attention of the USA Baseball Women’s National Team. Team USA director Ashley Bratcher’s mother had been watching Mizzou play Texas A&M on television, and when she heard from the announcer that Jenna Marston had played baseball in high school, she called Ashley.

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