The CT Softball Blog

STRATFORD—Before the first pitch of the season was even thrown, Gary Sherrick delivered the most important message his team would hear all year.

Before the Stratford-Notre Dame West Haven co-op squad opened the season on Saturday, Sherrick reminded his players that the game, as important as it feels, especially on opening day, is still just a game—and that showing up for each other is what matters the most.

This is a story of love and family.

Of a coach and his players.

And it is a story of a man and the nearly 102-year-old woman who was a beacon of light for all those who knew her.

The story itself actually begins more a decade ago, if not a century ago.

The easiest way to put it is to say Sherrick married into the Stratford High School softball family.

When his wife, Jacqueline, was named the head coach of the Red Devils softball team in 2014, he became a de facto assistant.

To have and to hold from this day forward; for better, for worse; for richer, for poorer; in sickness and health; until rain outs do us part.

When Jackie stepped down coming out of the missed COVID season of 2020, Gary Sherrick stayed, taking over the head coaching duties and fighting to keep his program relevant in a town that seems to have left softball behind.

This past year, with his program’s numbers dwindling, Sherrick single-handedly fought to have his team co-op with Notre Dame-West Haven so his players would have a season, and so the NDWH program, which is in the first year of being a co-ed school, could start to build a future in the sport.

After all, you fight for your family and that’s exactly what the coach did because “family” is exactly what the Stratford program had become to the Sherricks, and their two daughters.

The Stratford-NDWH softball family—from pitcher to catcher, from left field to right, from third base to first base, from heart to mind to soul, from 245 King Street here in Stratford all the way to the hallways of NDWH—is just that: a family.

It is something the Sherricks have always preached. A team, a program, is far more than something that appears for two hours a day inside the baselines of a random softball field every spring.

So, on Saturday morning, when Sherrick lost his family’s matriarch, his great-grandmother, whose century-plus on this earth left impacts even she truly couldn’t fathom, he knew he had another family he could lean on for support.

After all, the Stratford-West Haven Co-op softball team had its season opener just hours later.

Despite the loss in his heart, Sherrick knew where he had to be.

In the dugout. With family.

It was a message his Stratford-NDWH team heard loud and clear in the moments after their 9-0, season-opening win over Harding.

It was so moving to the players that they sent along a message to the CT Softball Blog.

“We wanted to reach out to shed some light on what Coach Sherrick means to us and the game of softball,” the message read, sent through the team’s Instagram account. “(Saturday) morning, he was in the hospital with his grandmother and unfortunately, she passed away. He could have skipped our first game, but he came to the field just a few hours of her passing with a smile on his face, giving us motivational speeches as he always does. Helped guide us to a victory and helped ND earn their first win school’s history. He will kill us once he finds out we messaged you, but he deserves it.”

Everybody deserves to have a “3G” in their life.

That is what the Sherrick family called Thelma Burr —“3G”— as in the Great, Great Grandmother to their daughters, McKenzie and Sadie.

The memories of her are forever embedded in the lives of the Sherrick family.

“Whether you met her and listened to her stories or learned about her through our own stories of 3G; you can feel how impactful she was,” Jackie Sherrick wrote in a Facebook post honoring 3G. “She left our family a legacy of lessons and love.”

In his own Facebook post, Gary Sherrick summarized 3G as such: “Be present in your kids’ lives, show up for loved ones, make time for yourself, don’t expect anything from anyone and don’t put up with people’s sh#t were just a few things you have taught us. You are one of the biggest reasons that helped make me into the man I am today.”

Show up for loved ones.

That’s exactly what the coach did for his team on Saturday.

His team knew something was up on Friday when he received a phone call that pulled him away from practice and to the hospital.

Sherrick had planned on visiting 3G before getting on the bus and going to Saturday’s season-opening game, but an early morning phone call changed those plans.

“My plan was to go see her yesterday morning but I got a call around 5:15, saying she had passed away,” Sherrick recalled this morning. “I got dressed and went to the hospital for a couple of hours, but we had to get home and talk to the girls about what happened. I toyed with not going to the game, but like Jackie said, even just to get your head off things for two hours.”

The emptiness of the loss could only be filled by being around family, the win or loss on the field was secondary to the message.

Show up for loved ones.

Sherrick showed up for his team, his family.

It meant everything to him. It meant everything to them.

Coach Sherrick got to be there as Morgan Letizia and Mary Sowitcky combined on a three-hit shutout, collectively striking out nine over the course of the game.

He got to see his players like Riley Dicks, Olivia Leimgruber, Avery Taber and Sowitcky notch two hits each.

He got to witness the win that allowed his new co-op team to start the season at 1-0, turning an immeasurable internal loss into an on-the-field victory the coach and his players will never forget.

They found out about Sherrick’s loss after the game and buried the coach, Jackie, and their girls with love and compassion in their time of loss.

“They didn’t know until after the game, and we were talking and I just told them I appreciated everything but she had passed away,” Sherrick said. “It was so amazing that it wasn’t even the kids who I’ve known for most of their lives, but the kids I just met two weeks ago were coming up to us and giving their love and support, showing Sadie, McKenzie, Jackie; even parents we don’t really know that well yet. It was the most positive thing in that kind of situation.”

Sherrick showed up for his loved ones. His loved ones in turn showed up for him.

Sometimes in life, we forget that these games we play are just that.

Instead of embracing the moments, the positivity of what is happening around us, we gripe about playing time or scream at umpires who are doing their best.

We all need to be better in that regard.

We all should learn a little something from 3G, who over the course of her 101 years turned her life of experiences into messages she would teach to new generations.

She knew Gary and Jackie were coaching a softball program which at times struggled in both numbers and depth.

“She knew what Jackie and I were doing in coaching and she would always ask about it, every spring,” the coach recalled. “She was very blunt. ‘Somebody has to love those kids and teach them how to play. You just have to whip them into shape.’ She was legendary.”

So many lessons handed down over all those years.

Gary heard those messages his whole life, and he used them as guide while growing up and starting his own family.

The memories. The messages. The lessons.

On Saturday, on the opening day of the 2026 high school softball season, with a hole in his heart, Sherrick passed along one to his team, his family.

Show up for loved ones.

(From The Dugout is a regular column written by CT Softball Blog Publisher John Nash)

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