East grad Gammon adjusts to college softball
Ex-Lancer plays second base for Missouri State
Gammon appeared in 42 of the Bears' 50 games, including 35 starts. She batted .207 with seven RBI and a team-high eight stolen bases.
"At the very beginning of the year I was batting a little over .300 and then I hit a nice little batting slump for a while," Gammon said. "I ended up getting sick and I was out for two weeks and after that it kind of went downhill. My actual (Missouri Valley) conference batting average wasn't that pretty, but my overall average was decently good for my freshman year. I learned a lot from just getting the experience - that makes all the difference."At the beginning of the year, me and (freshman) Jenna Schwark, the other second baseman, pretty much split time pretty evenly. Whenever I wasn't playing at second, I was the DH, so I was hitting almost every game. It was a little hard to get used to at first because you're used to getting out on the field and you're sitting on the bench and waiting to hit. After a while, you get used to it and you're cheering on the team, so you're still involved in the game. By the end of the year, I was mostly just the DH."
It took a while for Gammon to make the adjustment to hitting on the collegiate level, but her summer softball experience was a plus.
"Luckily I've been playing for the St. Louis Saints - this will be my third year with them - and that made a big difference, just kind of introducing me to the pitching," Gammon said. "I got to face college pitchers and pitchers that were older than college age.
"I played against a lot of the (Southern Illinois University) Carbondale girls and a lot of the Bradley girls, so there were some people in our conference that I had already played against. Still, it was hard and I learned some slight variations on my batting technique that really helped me out and made it more of a college swing.
"Defensively, it was a little bit of an adjustment too. The pitching is faster and it's better, but the hitters are also bigger and stronger and the ball gets hit that much harder off the bat. It's basically the same thing, but you always have to be ready and on your toes. The runners are running more aggressively and smarter than in high school, so that's something else you have to get used to."
Missouri State finished the season with a 28-22 record, losing 7-2 to Drake in the MVC championship game.
"That was awesome because we were seeded seventh in the tournament and they only take eight teams," said Gammon, who had a two-out RBI triple in the second inning. "We ended up winning three games before we lost to Drake.
"No one expected us to go that far. Our hotel wasn't reserved for as many days as we needed to be there, so we had to find a different hotel."
Playing a spring sport, Gammon had a little more time to adjustment to college life before her freshman season.
"I definitely feel that made a big difference," she said. "The basketball players, who play during the winter, come during the summer and start taking classes to get that adjustment period. Since we play in the spring, the fall is important to get school organized. We start working out pretty intensively and getting to know each other as a team and get that chemistry going.
"In the classroom, things went pretty well. I'm on the Board of Governors Scholarship at Missouri State, so I have to keep a 3.5 grade-point average. I think I'm going to major in advertising and promotions. I definitely want to do something in business and that's what I'm aiming at as of now."
At Belleville East, Gammon was a three-year varsity starter.
"My sophomore year I got brought up to play third base and they realized that was a terrible decision," she said, laughing. "It was a little too close for my taste because I was used to playing shortstop my whole life. So I ended up playing second base that year and shortstop the next two years. I also played some at second base for the Saints, so playing second in college wasn't that big of an adjustment.
"Playing at a program like Belleville East really prepares you for college ball. At Missouri State, we practice hard and we do everything hard, but at East we were sprinting and hustling everywhere. You respect your coaches and you respect your teammates.
"It really helped with my mental preparation for college because we would have mental training sessions and those are things that Coach (Natalie) Peters and Coach (Rita) Menke taught us too. Talking to people from other schools, they didn't do all the stuff we did."
This summer, Gammon is playing once again for the Saints, who recently competed in a tournament in Bloomington.
"Autumn Allen (a pitcher and a 2008 Belleville East graduate) is playing for us - she started playing at the end of last year," Gammon said. "(Lauren White (a 2007 East graduate) also plays for us and she just finished her freshman year at SWIC (Southwestern Illinois College).
"We also have (2005 East graduate) Shea Lodes (who recently completed her junior season at the University of Texas-El Paso). There's also a girl from Belleville West, Grace Young, who played up at Tulsa this year.
"There's a girl from Bradley that I played against during the season and there's three girls from Purdue and a girl from Indiana State. We have a very wide range of players."
Gammon is anxious to see what she can accomplish in her sophomore season at Missouri State.
"I think they're definitely looking at me to play second base and to keep working on my bat. I'm starting to incorporate more hitting and swinging because I pretty much just slapped and bunted this year. If I'm not playing second base, they're thinking about preparing me to play in the outfield a couple times too. That would be kind of a test to see how it goes, but I think they like me on the infield."
