The CT Softball Blog

BRISTOL—The noise inside the A. Bartlett Giamatti Little League Leadership Training Center kept building.

Over the course of six innings, Bristol and Rhode Island went back and forth in last week’s New England Regional championship game. At stake? A trip to the Little League Softball World Series.

The crowd felt every pitch.

Ava LeFurgey did not.

The 13-year-old Bristol pitcher had already demonstrated throughout this entire summer, not just the New England tournament, that pressure does not seem to reach her inside the circle. Not the crowd. Not the television cameras. Not the possibility that one pitch could decide whether Bristol’s summer continued.

Away from the field, LeFurgey appears to be quiet and shy. Ask her why she became a pitcher and she struggles to explain it.

Give her the softball, however, and an entirely different personality emerges.

“She can tune everything else out,” Bristol manager Adam Whitlock said. “Parents, crowd, coaches, teammates; she can tune everything out and just be single-minded on something.”

When LeFurgey says she does not get nervous, Whitlock believes her.

“That’s real, man,” he said. “That kid, Ava, is tough. Her mentality is, ‘I’m going to beat you.’ She doesn’t want to get beat.”

That resolve helped Bristol survive the most dramatic game of its summer.

Down 3-1 entering the bottom of the sixth against Rhode Island, Bristol scored three times to win the New England championship and earn its place in the Little League Softball World Series in Greenville, North Carolina.

LeFurgey acknowledged that the final inning was nerve-racking, but her confidence in her teammates never wavered.

“We all had trust in each other that everybody could hit,” she said. “We never lost hope. We just kept cheering.”

Her calm was apparent well before the first pitch.

LeFurgey’s father Anthony expected his daughter to show at least some nerves before pitching in front of a packed crowd with a regional championship at stake. Instead, she moved around the field talking with teammates and coaches.

“She had her head right in the game right from the start,” he said. “It was absolutely amazing to watch how she handled herself in the circle. Super proud. Super proud dad.”

The path that brought LeFurgey there began in the family’s backyard.

Her father installed a batting cage when Ava and her older sister, Alaina, were approximately 7 and 9. The family needed someone to pitch and someone to catch.

Ava volunteered to pitch. Alaina became the catcher.

“It just took off from that,” their father said.

Ava eventually began working with respected pitching instructor Kim Bogan and has taken lessons for approximately three years. The work helped her pitch Bristol to a state championship as a 10-year-old, a Northeast Regional championship at 11 and now a New England title at 12.

Whitlock does not describe LeFurgey as a pitcher who towers above everyone else on Bristol’s deep staff.

Lucy Kalat can throw harder. Avery Collins can provide precision. Lucy Bastiaanse changes speeds and keeps hitters uncomfortable. Bristol has won important games with each of them in the circle.

LeFurgey, however, provides the team with its baseline.

Whitlock knows what he will receive when she is focused.

“She just needs a little motivation,” he said. “A little focus, a little determination. You get her focused, and she will follow through on that.”

LeFurgey also accepts that being part of a pitching staff means the ball will not always remain in her hand.

After struggling against Fairfield during the first Sectional tournament game earlier in the summer, LeFurgey was removed from the game. Rather than sulking, she trusted the pitcher replacing her.

“I definitely don’t have anything to be down about when I know the next pitcher who goes in is going to get the job done,” she said.

Later in the tournament, Whitlock returned LeFurgey to the circle against Fairfield, giving her an opportunity to close the game and erase the memory of her earlier outing.

“She knows that if she needs a rest, someone else can come in and get the job done,” Whitlock said.

That team-first attitude also reflects the relationship Ava shares with Alaina, who recently completed her freshman year at Bristol Eastern and helped lead the Bristol Junior All-Stars to a state championship this summer.

The sisters are separated by approximately 18 months and grew up sharing batting cages, hitting lessons and softball conversations. This summer, both won state championships with their respective Bristol teams and advanced to regional competition.

Their parents occasionally had to “divide and conquer,” with one attending Alaina’s game and the other following Ava, Anthony said.

The sisters also provide honest evaluations of each other’s performances.

“They ride each other’s case,” their father said. “Just the other day after Alaina’s game, Ava goes, ‘Why did she do this? Why did she do that?’ They push each other 100 percent.”

They compete over which sister is better, but remain each other’s biggest supporters.

“I just think it’s really cool to have two sisters win states and go to regionals,” Ava said.

Alaina will eventually have company at Bristol Eastern. Ava will enter eighth grade this fall and plans to follow her sister into the Lancers’ softball program.

First comes North Carolina and the opportunity to pitch on Little League softball’s largest stage.

The crowds will be bigger. The television audience will grow. The pressure surrounding every pitch will intensify.

LeFurgey plans to treat it exactly as she treated the regional games shown on ESPN.

“It was cool,” she said, “but I wasn’t nervous at all because it was just another game.”

For the quiet kid from Bristol, it usually is.

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