Just a few weeks ago, playing college softball didn’t seem like it was in the cards for Sydney Phillips.
“I first started out thinking that I wasn’t going to . But I had played my whole life, and I made a last-minute decision to play softball,” she says.
That last-minute decision led to a match with Park University near Kansas City.
“One of my friends who played softball was looking into going to Park. I wasn’t very interested, but then I visited the campus and met the coach and really liked it,” Phillips says.
“We were very fortunate to have Sydney in our program for the last four years,” says coach Lee Dishman. “What Sydney’s really good at is being versatile. She can play anywhere you want on the field and she’ll give you everything she’s got all the time. She’s not very vocal … but she leads by example on the field.”
Phillips says the small campus size and its location helped draw her to Park.
“The campus is really cute. It’s about the size of Republic’s high school, and it’s in Kansas City, so if you want to go out and do something, you can do that.”
Phillips says she knows her versatility as a player could be a big advantage as she steps up to the college level.
“My favorite position is catcher, but I’m not really built like a catcher, so I knew it would help to learn how to play outfield and learn how to play infield, so I could play anywhere.”
