RIDGEFIELD—Somewhere along her trip around life’s basepaths, Rita Jagodzinski realized her passion had drifted from basketball to softball.
She had played both while a standout athlete at Stamford Catholic and after graduating from Springfield College, where she played two years before a shoulder injury ended her career, she received a phone call that changed her life.
“Come coach,” the caller said.
“I fell in love with coaching softball,” Jagodzinski said. “I fell in love with teaching people, playing the game the right way. I told one of my players last year, I want to be the coach I would have needed at your stage in life; be a mentor, be a role model.”
Jagodzinski, who runs her own travel program, the CT Jags, out of Norwalk, has coached the game from the 8U level all the way up to the Division 1 college ranks.
This spring, however, Jagodzinski will be back in a varsity dugout in the FCIAC as the new head coach at Ridgefield High School.
“I knew she had coached in the league before, so I was excited when I saw that she had applied,” Ridgefield athletic director Dane Street said. “She interviewed really well. She was able to explain her philosophy of coaching the whole athlete and not focusing on wins and losses. She clearly knows her softball.”
It has become Jagodzinski’s life.
Last spring, she was an assistant coach at Iona. After the head coach stepped down for personal reasons after just two seasons, the new Gaels coach brought in his own staff, leaving Jagodzinski outside the dugout for a while.
She considered seeking out another college job, but the Stamford-born coach simply didn’t want to make major changes to her life.
“I like where I live,” she said.
She knew she would return to the field, though.
After all, once she got pulled into coaching, Jagodzinski hasn’t stopped.
She’s been an assistant coach at both Trinity Catholic and Darien and was even the girls golf coach at the King School in Stamford.
“Boy, that was a tough job,” she quipped. “Playing golf every day?”
Jagodzinski loves coaching so much that when three teams needed a new home, she founded her own travel program.
The CT Jags were born.
“It wasn’t my dream but keep kids on the field and playing was very important,” Jagodzinski said. “
At Ridgefield, the coach sees a program that took some heavy graduation hits—including two of the league’s best starting pitchers—from last year’s 15-5 squad that made it to the FCIAC championship game, falling to Fairfield Ludlowe, 5-2.
“They’ve had an incredible run the last couple of years, and I know they have quite a few players who play on travel teams,” Jagodzinski said. “Ridgefield has a proud tradition and I’m looking forward to building a culture of not just strong softball players who want to compete, but accountable resilient adults in the future. That’s my job.”
Despite not being in the FCIAC for a handful of years, Jagodzinski has kept her eye on the league.
“It’s still a strong league and I’m looking forward to competing,” she said.
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