Central head coach Matt Brandhagen guided the Cobblers to their first-ever state championship last season. (Photo Sam Hurst/IDS)

Four teams. Eight varsity games in less than 24 hours. You gotta love softball.

The South Dakota high school softball season is so short that there is no time for pomp or ceremony. Roosevelt and Lincoln crossed the Missouri River Friday afternoon, played doubleheaders against Central and Stevens Friday night, showered off the dirt, did a little homework, caught a few hours of sleep, and were back at Parkview complex at 9 a.m. Saturday morning for a second round of doubleheaders.

By noon Saturday, the hits and slides and clouds of dust were all a blur. But one statistic leaped out. Rapid City’s two high schools won seven of the eight games. Rapid City players pounded the ball up and down their lineups. Old familiar names like Merriam and Everson stepped up, but younger players also found their grove. With only a one-inning lapse of focus Friday night, Rapid City pitchers were dominant, led by Lien, Geerson, and Green. Five of the seven games were blowouts.

Why?

What is it about the development of the two Rapid City softball programs that has catapulted them to the top of the state?

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High school softball has never completely found its season: battle the wet snows of spring, or the cold winds of autumn? Softball is still finding its traditions. Women who have faced fierce competition on their summer traveling teams, find themselves suddenly trapped in a short-season club sport, without the school support or legacy of sanctioned sports like volleyball and cross-country. Teams struggle with consistency and competition. Because of all these factors, most high school softball programs in South Dakota are still stuck in the twilight zone between well-trained professional coaching and parent volunteers. That’s not the case with Central and Stevens, and that’s the difference.

Local softball fans are well acquainted with Central coach Matt Brandhagen. He is president of ASA. For four years he coached the 18-year-old Sizzle to the top of the national rankings, and four of his starters will end up playing college softball. He took over the Central High School program two years ago, and won the state championship last year. He’s been coaching girls’ softball for fifteen years, including a stint as pitching and hitting coach at Mt. Marty College. Brandhagen knows his stuff.

This year, cross-town rival Stevens doubled down on Brandhagen’s experience and hired a newcomer to build their softball program.

Eva Burley is the wife of an Air Force officer stationed at Ellsworth. She commands the softball field with the physical confidence of a general who knows her battlefield. But the giveaway that there is something more to Burley than middle-aged fitness and a love of the game, is the name of her young son, Easton. That’s Easton…as in the Easton bat company. “My husband and I met playing coed softball.” she remembers with a smile.

Eva Burley is in her first season as the head softball coach of Rapid City Stevens. Burley played softball in college at Texas Tech and was a four-year starter prior to coming to Rapid City. (Photo Sam Hurst/IDS)

Yeah, right. My bet is that is wasn’t a fourth of July pickup game with a beer in one hand and the softball in the other.

It turns out, Ms. Burley is none other than a four-year starter at Texas Tech University, and veteran coach at Division 5A New Braunfels High School just north of San Antonio.

Former Stevens coach, Todd Maiden, says that Burley’s high-energy arrival is just what the Stevens girls needed. “The first week of tryouts and the first few practices, it was a huge change for the girls. But now that they understand coach Burley it’s become a tremendous opportunity for the girls, especially the ones who aspire to play college athletes. There isn’t any Mickey-Mousing around. It’s very disciplined. It’s a very tight ship. If they don’t meet the expectations, there are consequences, but it is all team oriented. She’s brought all 41 girls in the program, from top to bottom, to a new level.”

After the games, Stevens players make their way quickly to the grass behind first base, take a knee, and listen intently to Burley’s post-game comments. Between games Friday night, tired and filthy from their 9-4 loss to Roosevelt, the whole team picked up rakes and prepared the field for the second game. It is all part of a disciplined approach to the game that celebrates precision and hard work.

Senior pitcher, Brittney Geerson, admits that Burley’s discipline and attention to detail was tough to take at first. “I had to get used to it. I’ve never had a coach be as blunt like that. I like it now. I know that she is telling me the truth instead of just saying things to make me feel better.”

Senior catcher Erica Everson played four years for the Sizzle, where she was coached by Matt Brandhagen. Now, during the high school season, she plays for Burley. “She’s definitely more strict. She says that practices will always be harder than games ever will be. One day she made us do position drills, and since I’m a catcher, she made me duck walk to the fence and back. It was terrible.”

Todd’s Maiden’s daughter, senior centerfielder Kalie Maiden, agrees that Burley’s discipline was tough to get used to. “She makes us work a lot harder. She pushes us. We do stuff that we’ve never been taught before. We’ve just learned how to hit opposite field. She’s teaching us how to hit behind the runner. If we don’t do it correctly, we have a punishment. We have to run or do up/downs.”

Watching Brandhagen and Burley in the third base coaching box is a study in contrast. Brandhagen is intensely attentive to game situations, but he can go a whole inning without saying three words. He almost never “coaches” or “corrects” while a player is at bat. “I know my girls. I know when to pump them up.” He told me. “I trust my girls and I don’t get too riled up.”

Burley, by comparison, is the Energizer Bunny. She paces relentlessly. Her arms are always in motion. She twists and turns her body as if she is still in the batter’s box, herself, staring down a two-strike count. She talks to the hitters nonstop. “Stay stacked and loaded.” She admonishes Kalie Maiden. “Be on time, 5, here we go. Stay tall when you go.” Against Lincoln’s off-speed pitcher, Burley groans to the dugout, “See it from her hip. Everybody is collapsing because we’re reaching for the ball. Stay stacked!”

From clean up hitter Erica Everson, who hits for power and average, Burley demands the most. “You’re dancing. Be patient. You’re better than that.” When Everson swings weakly at a low, inside changeup, Burley is quick to the point. “I don’t mind if you swing at that pitch. But you’re never going to hit it hard. If you’re going to swing, I want you to come out of your shoes. Swing hard at it!”

I asked Everson after the game if Burley’s intensity is distracting. “No. When she talks, it actually calms me down. The fans and other coaches get in your head, but she just calms me down and tells me what to do.”

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Born in Singapore, raised in Oklahoma and Texas, Burley learned to play softball in the pressure cooker of elite Texas travel teams. “There are a lot of colleges in Texas, so you are going to be seen by a lot of coaches if you play competitively. I played for a Houston team when I lived in San Antonio. So I would travel to Houston and play gold ball. That’s how I was recruited to Texas Tech.”

At Texas Tech, she spent the first half of her freshman year in rotation with another girl, and won the competition. From that point on, she played every game of every season until she graduated. Burley still holds the record at Texas Tech for most games played.

Burley has a breadth of experience at the highest levels of competition that Rapid City girls can only dream about. “Here in Rapid City, we have two high school teams.” She lamented. “In San Antonio, they have forty. The teams in Texas play lots of competition and they play different competition.”

I ask her: “Put our two high schools in a forty team San Antonio high school league. Where do they fit? Lower third?”

“I don’t think softball is behind here. The girls here have a great foundation, work ethic, and discipline. What’s great is that they have allowed me to come in with a different mind set, a different outlook, a different push, a different expectation. And they are trying to match my expectations all the time. But it’s difficult to judge because in Texas they would be facing a lot higher quality pitching for a longer period of time. There’s not such an abundance of quality pitching here. So it’s hard for me to gauge the hitters. But I think this is one of the best hitting teams I’ve ever coached. These girls work very, very hard, and they are very coachable.”

Burley has also brought an intense focus on the mental side of the game, which leads me to ask the most illusive of all questions in women’s sports: “Does it matter that you’re a woman coach rather than a man?”

She doesn’t offer an immediate answer. She knows there isn’t an easy answer. Burley has been coached by both men and women. She has seen men like Matt Brandhagen get the most out of their players. But finally she offers her insight.

“Yes. I think it matters that I am a woman, and it matters that I am a woman who can still play. I can’t hang toe-to-toe with them. But I can still provide examples of drills. I can still slide. I can still take a drop step and catch balls. I can still field. I think that matters because when I’m pushing them, and I have such high expectations for them, and I turn around and show them exactly what I want. They develop the attitude, ‘Well, if she can do it, we can do it.’ I think it gives them confidence that, ‘Here’s a woman who is independent, and strong willed, and competitive, and went out and played herself, and is now trying to get us to do the same thing. I think they are empowered by me being a woman.”

Todd Maiden has watched the process up close. “Coach Burley will come to practice and put her softball pants on, and she will teach the girls three or four different techniques of sliding. She’s till faster than most of our girls. When she is batting, she can place the ball wherever she wants. That gains her a lot of respect. Not only can she instruct and teach, she can demonstrate. I don’t care if you want to talk about an outfield drill, first base… she’ll go out to first base and do the splits. Well, you won’t see any of us doing that.”

Burley’s up close and personal approach has allowed her to push the Stevens girls harder and faster than they have ever been pushed, and to create a culture of rapid improvement.

“I think it’s a misconception that girls can’t be pushed.” She tells me. “They can be pushed. Being mentally tough is such a key to women’s sports. Girls need many different aspects of discipline. Girls want to know that with all the hard work they put in, that you care about them. In my opinion, girls love to please. They love to please people they respect. They love to please people who have high expectations for them. They can be pushed because of that.”

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For Eva Burley and Matt Brandhagen, success has created a whole new set of expectations and problems. The best players in Rapid City are ready to play college softball. A few are even ready to play mid-major and D-1. But it’s hard to get college looks as long as they are isolated on the northern plains, playing weather-shortened seasons. Burley places the burden of getting to the next level squarely on the shoulders of the girls and parents.

“I don’t see the tenacity to ‘go get your scholarship’ here. I think that girls are sitting back waiting for it to happen instead of making it happen.”

“Our parents and players don’t grasp the importance of starting when you are 13 and 14. For juniors, those big D-1s are done recruiting. They recruited their big girls when they were freshmen and sophomores in high school. The older you get, the more limited your choices are.”

“In my opinion, the way to start the process is to understand that it is never too early to begin. It’s never too early to start putting your name out there. It’s never too early to start going to exposure tournaments, and to these camps, and to be recognized and seen.”

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By mid-afternoon on Saturday, Lincoln and Roosevelt were headed east across the Missouri River, already planning their revenge at the state tournament in Sioux Falls at the end of the month.

Meanwhile, back at Parkview, a cross-town show down between Central and Stevens is scheduled for Monday night. It will be a repeat of last year’s state championship game. Matt Brandhagen will be stoically plotting in the third base coaching box for Central. Eva Burley will be pacing and chattering in the third base coaching box for Stevens. Central’s shortstop, Maddie Merriam, will step into the batter’s box against her Sizzle teammate and close friend Erica Everson, behind the plate for Stevens. Summer hugs and smiles will give way to autumn competition. It will be the best game in town…the best game in the state.