Stevens senior catcher Erica Everson has been the catalyst for a hard-nosed, yet loose Raider team. (Photo Sam Hurst/IDS)

In the fourth inning of last week’s showdown between the Central and Stevens softball teams, with nobody out and runners on first and second, Stevens catcher, Erica Everson, called timeout and gathered her infield at the mound.

The stadium at Parkview was packed. Brittany Geerson had just put Stevens up by one run with a grand slam in the top of the third, and Everson was in no mood to let Central back in the game. But in softball, a runner on second, with nobody out, is almost a sure run. A bunt, a slap, a misplayed fly ball to the outfield, a throw to the wrong base, almost anything…and arch-rival Central would be right back in the game.

There was also deeper meaning to the looming Central threat. This was the first time that Stevens and Central had faced off since the Cobblers beat the Raiders to win the state championship a year ago. For Stevens veterans the loss still stuck in their craw. Everson’s competitive juices were pumping, and she was not about to let it happen again.

The Stevens infield is young. Everson and pitcher Brittney Geerson are seniors, but first baseman Megan Green and Ashley Jennings at third are both sophomores. Abby Walz at second and Courtney Buck at shortstop are juniors. All are summer softball veterans, but they are just finding their chemistry as a unit.

So it was fitting that Everson would calmly take off her mask, twirl her arm to rally the troops, and walk to the mound with the grim determination of a battlefield commander. This was no time for the Stevens girls to get rattled. It was time to bear down and focus, time to make sure everyone knew her assignment. It was time for the senior catcher to take charge.

Stevens coach, Eva Burley, sat stone-faced on her bucket at the entrance to the dugout. Calling timeout to cut the tension and calm the nerves was just the kind of leadership that Burley expected from her senior catcher. “It comes to me naturally,” Erica told me. “But at the beginning of the game Coach Burley told me that if things got really tense and riled up, I should to go out and calm things down.”

I watched the scene unfold through the long lens on my camera, searching for the little nuances of body language and tension; maybe a finger in the face to Walz, about rotating toward first base if the batter bunted, or chin—to—chin instructions to Green about charging hard on a bunt.

This was the exact moment I had come to see: the moment of clutch leadership, the moment when character would be revealed. I waited impatiently to see how the team would respond. Five seconds passed. Ten seconds passed. They were all listening intently to Everson. And then…they burst out laughing.

Laughing? There’s no laughing in softball!

“I just told them to take a breath, so we all took a breath together. And I’m like, ‘Guys…it’s okay. Just calm down.’ I cracked a joke. I’m kind of the funny person on the team. I just tried to lift people’s spirits up.”

Everson and Stevens third baseman Ashley Jennings have a laugh in the middle of a tense game against Central after the Raider catcher made a shoestring catch. (Photo Jake Nordbye/IDS)

“She never talks about infield assignments.” Walz told me later. “She just tries to keep us loose. She calms us down and makes sure we’re ready to play.”

“She doesn’t give us instructions.” Explained shortstop, Courtney Buck. “But she’s very motivational. She’s very relaxed, so it relaxes us. She says, ‘Come on, guys, we can do this. We’ve got this.”

“She’s always trying to pick us up.” Says third baseman Ashley Jennings. “And she’s very funny. She always has a big smile.”

“She’s the funniest person on the team.” Geerson explained. “I love her as a catcher. If I get upset, she can calm me down. She’s always making everybody laugh. She is not shy at all. Don’t let her fool you. She’s hilarious.”

The next batter popped out to Erica behind the plate. Geerson struck out the second batter. The third batter grounded weakly to Buck for a 6-5 force at third. Stevens got out of the inning unscathed and went on to win the game 5-4.

“Some people like to lead by being loud, and talking and pumping their teammates up, and some lead by example.” Eva Burley told me after the game. “I think Erica has a great way of balancing both. She doesn’t just talk to hear herself talk. She doesn’t lead just because it’s expected of her. She leads when the moment is right. She talks when the moment is right. And she leads by example. When the time is right, she can get her teammates to laugh and loosen up, and whenever there’s a pressure situation, you won’t find anyone else who is more focused.”

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Everson blocks the plate and tags out Central's Kassy Herding after a squeeze bunt in the third inning Monday night. Stevens edged Central 3-1 in a game filled with outstanding defensive plays. (Photo Jake Nordbye/IDS)

Erica Everson is an enigma. The same leader who does such a great job of keeping her teammates loose and confident describes herself as a bundle of nerves before every game. “I know that I’m a leader. I know that I’m important to the team. But I don’t think I’m that good.” Everson offers, sheepishly. “I love softball. I’ve loved it from the beginning when I was 9 years old playing t-ball. I feel like it’s my game. But it doesn’t matter who we’re playing, if we’re playing Gillette or Central. I’m nervous. And then, when the game starts, I get loose and just have fun.”

“Do you handle academic tests that way?” I asked her.

“Yeah. I get test anxiety really bad.”

“I know she gets anxious before games, but I’ve never seen it affect her play.” Says Erica’s summer Sizzle coach Matt Brandhagen. “She’s always telling me, ‘I’m nervous.’ But once she hits the field, she’s just smooth.”

“I don’t see it.” Says coach Burley. “But maybe she’s my little duck. Maybe the feet are paddling like crazy below the surface and she looks calm on top. I think anyone who is competitive gets that way before a big game. They get very anxious. What’s good about Erica is that she uses the anxiety that could go in a negative direction with a different person, and takes it in a positive direction.”

That’s Burley’s way of saying that anxiety or not, Everson is clutch. She’s batting over .500 this season as Stevens’ 4-hole hitter, with four home runs, and behind the plate she is a ferocious wall. “The team looks to Erica.” Burley says. “They know that when they are on base and she’s up to bat something good is going to happen. They believe that when it’s crunch time, she’s that one who is going to lead them. They have so much faith that she’s not going to let them down when it comes to work ethic, or game situations.”

Erica’s deepest bond is to her Sizzle sisterhood. She describes the laid back style of her coach, Matt Brandhagen, as a perfect fit for a group of girls who have played together for four years, and are so close they can read each other’s minds. Her relationship with Brandhagen is so secure that last season she began calling her own games. “That was tough for me.” Brandhagen explained. “I’ve called pitches for the last fifteen years. To trust a girl to do that and do it right is very difficult. She’s amazing. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a catcher call pitches except when we played in nationals in Minneapolis. There were a couple of girls who called their games. But around here, absolutely not. I trust her. She’ll come in the dugout and I’ll say, ‘Do you know who’s up next?’ And she’ll say, ‘Yeah, absolutely. I got it.’”

As the Raiders No. 4 batter Everson is hitting .500 this season with four homeruns. During the summers she plays for the ASA Sizzle and is one of the most respected hitters in the league. (Photo Jake Nordbye/IDS)

With all the summer success Erica has had playing four years for the Sizzle, Burley wasn’t sure how her relationship with Everson would develop. “I think at the very beginning of the year, because I was new, people were skeptical about whether she would work hard because of how strict I was. They thought she might be the one who would be most stubborn, because I was going to demand so much out of her. And she really, really surprised a lot of people in the way that she just worked so hard and never complained.”

As thoughts turn to college, Erica has come to appreciate Eva Burley’s big-time college experience and demanding attention to detail.

“I love playing for her. She gets things done. And she has really helped me improve on little things. My catching has gotten a lot better. I’ve been working on digging balls out of the dirt, and because of all the conditioning Coach Burley makes us do, I’m even faster behind the plate. At bat, I’ve been working a lot on hitting to the opposite field.”

“At the beginning of the season Coach Burley told us that practices would be harder than games. At first it was terrible. But there are always little things that you can improve. It’s what you have to do to get better.”

At the plate, Burley has had a big influence, not so much by changing Erica’s mechanics, but by teaching a more intense preparation for every at-bat, and teaching Erica to look for specific pitches in specific situations.

“Athletically Erica is a very, very good hitter.” Says Burley. “And she’s been coached very well. She’s smart at the plate. She’s getting better with every at-bat, in terms of looking for the right pitch to hit in each specific situation. She has such a big role on this team, being the 4-hole hitter, that she may only see one good pitch a night. So, she can’t be lulled to sleep. She can’t lose focus if she sees that one good pitch that she’s been looking for all night. She has to stay locked in. She has to be on time.”

How prescient is Burley’s comment? In the strange crossover world of girls’ softball, Brandhagen is Erica’s summer coach and fall rival. He works with her in the summer and plots against her in the fall, so he has a unique perspective of how a pitcher should approach Everson when she is at bat.

“There’s an urban legend out there that at last fall’s state tournament you walked Erica so you wouldn’t have to pitch to her.” I asked Brandhagen recently. He bristled at the suggestion he would do anything else.

“You’re damn right. I walked her four times. I know what she can do. I wasn’t about to let her take the game from us.”

As he walked away, Brandhagen stopped and turned. “And I’m going to do it again. It’s an absolute sign of respect. I’ve been her coach for four years. I know what she can do.”

If there is any one player in town who knows Erica best, it is probably her summer teammate and high school rival, Central shortstop, Maddie Merriam. “She’s one of my closest friends.” Maddie told me recently. “I like Erica behind the plate because she has that confidence. She’s not a super cocky player. She’s like the quarterback in the sense that she sees everything on the field. She’s not afraid to get dirty and as a catcher that’s what you want. She flips her mask off so quick, and she’s diving after balls. She’s not a girlie softball player. She likes to get after it. Even if she is in a slump, she always goes up to the plate with the same routine, the same confidence. You never see her down.”

Everson and Merriam will team up again next summer for one last Sizzle season. Sydney Larson will come home from Dordt College. Sarah Wilson will come home from Chadron State. Arguably the best team to ever come out of South Dakota will give it one last fling. “We’re planning on going to a big tournament, so we can play some really great competition before the team ends.” Erica says, wistfully. “You know, go out with a bang.”

That’s a great winter dream to get softball players through the cold, windy winter. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. On Monday night, Stevens and Central were back in a closely fought nail-biter at Parkview.

Everson called time out and beckoned her infield to the mound. Stevens was up 3-0, but Central had a runner on base and none other than Maddie Merriam at the plate. It was no time for the distraction of friendship. It was no time to lose focus. It was a good time to call the infield together at the mound, crack a joke, do a little dance, share a little laughter…and make sure everyone was loose.

Stevens won the game 3-1.