Big Cat

Raw Talent

Coming into Ashley Coleman’s senior season of softball at Molalla High School, the tall and talented player was in a bad spot. She was not seeing extended playing time and she felt like she was being pigeon-holed into the designated hitter spot. She was frustrated and felt like she was out of the loop; it was a far cry from where Ashley is today—a big hitting softball player on a full ride scholarship at Florida Institute of Technology with collegiate accolades a plenty and the nickname of Big Cat.

For Coleman, who has played some form of softball her entire life, the beginning her senior season things were not as bright.

“When I got (Coleman) her senior year, she wasn’t very mentally strong because she played DH and she never got to play much,” Molalla High School softball coach Chip Dickenson remembers.
Ashley and one other girl were the only seniors on the team though, so Dickenson knew that he needed them. “I sat them (the two seniors) down and said ‘hey, I need leadership. I need you girls to show up and lead by example.’”

Coleman responded.

Ashley began to work harder and refine her raw hitting power into a force to be reckoned with; and she also began to take interest in guiding the younger players on the team. Two of those players, Cassie Dickenson and Kendra Guest, are now seniors on the team and are in spots of leadership themselves.

“That was just awesome,” Dickenson says of when Ashley took the two freshmen under her wing. “She has got a great personality, she is funny but she can be serious when she needs to be—and the girls listen to her.”

Ashley had a successful senior season but as time was running out on her last year of high school softball, she was still unsure about her future.

“When I was in my senior year I didn’t really know what I wanted to do,” Coleman explains.
It was then that Dickenson stepped in and offered to help.

“I told her, ‘if you want to move on then I will find you a place,’” Dickenson says. He knew Coleman would be able to excel anywhere.

“That is one kid that I would have liked to have for three or four years,” Dickenson says. “She is probably one of the most gifted players to come out of Molalla. She can hit the softball probably harder than anyone that I have ever seen.”

Dickenson started working the phone lines; telling all of his contacts in the collegiate softball world about this tall girl who could smack the ball a mile.

First stop—Weed

A college six hours south in Weed, California was interested. The College of the Siskiyous and their coach, Doug Eastman, wanted Ashley, so she packed up and drove down for tryouts.

“I was a little bit nervous because it was a college tryout,” Ashley remembers.
While Ashley liked the team and the school, it was Eastman who really sold her on being part of the program.

“He was just a really great coach,” Coleman says. “He was just really smart about the game and he was really personable and he wasn’t just about softball; he would help you out with whatever you needed help with.”

Eastman was as equally pleased with the 5’11” girl from Oregon.

“One of the things I liked about her right away was her size and her strength,” Eastman says. “She was just a big, strong girl. She was that force on the offensive side where we knew at any given time she could hit a ball out of the yard.”

Coleman ended up a success down south, but that does not mean she was completely comfortable with leaving Molalla right away.

“It got time for her to go and she didn’t want to leave Molalla, and for a second there I didn’t think that she was going to go,” high school coach Chip Dickenson remembers. “But then we had a sit-down talk and I said ‘you know honey, it is a long way away but you should just go and try it because if you don’t like it you can always come back to Molalla.”

Even though Ashley had doubts about moving, the draw of a new adventure and the prospect of travel trumped them.

“Naturally I was hesitant about moving to go to school that was a good distance away from home,” Ashley recalls. “I didn’t know a soul down there in California and there were other options that I could’ve chosen that were ‘safer.’ Everyone I knew from high school was either staying in Molalla to work or going away with a friend. I was about to go out on my own alone. The one thought that really pushed me to go to the Siskiyous was that I was going to be seeing California—traveling and playing ball. I thought ‘what a great way to spend a couple of years.’”

Welcome to California

What a great way indeed to spend a couple of years. Ashley went all of the way down to California, left her friends, family and team, but ended up doing the exact same thing that she did at home—knocking the leather off of softballs.

“She was just a force at the offensive side,” Eastman says.

Ashley’s hitting was so special that an opposing coach described a homerun she hit as the hardest he had ever seen a softball smashed.

Ashley, driven to succeed, played mainly DH again in Weed, but she carved out a niche for herself in the spot and became invaluable to the team.

“That is what kind of made her special,” Eastman says. “You don’t always find a player like that who will just work on her hitting and do a great job when you call on her.”

To sit in the dugout and only get to play when your number is called to bat is something that would rattle a lot of other players but Coleman has her strategies to stay sharp.

“I don’t sit down, I really have to keep myself up and into the game and watch every pitch,” Ashley says. “I think that one of the hardest things is to try and not dwell on if you did badly in your last at-bat because you have so much time to think about it.”

Much of Coleman’s success generated from her strong work ethic. She was always one of the first to show up at practice and one of the last to leave. This was especially true in the weight room, which she poured herself into, and where she became a team leader.

“She was defiantly a leader, and more so than anyone in the weight room,” Eastman remembers. “She can out-lift anyone I have ever had down here. If anyone was not working hard on a specific day she would let them know it.”

A picture of Coleman lifting is still in place on the team’s website.

A hard past shaping a good future

While Ashley’s work ethic showed bright at the College of the Siskiyous, where she was named to two all-conference teams and an all-star team and set a school record with 15 homeruns, it is a characteristic that showed at a very young age.

In the fifth grade, Ashley suffered a wrist injury that made it impossible for her to play.

“From Ashley's very early years she has always been deeply invested in her team's success,” Ashley’s mother, Cindy Coleman remembers. “(After the injury) she insisted on attending all practices as well as games to support her team.”

That work ethic and drive to succeed is all the more impressive when it is contrasted against the traumatic things that Coleman has had to endure, starting at a young age.

“Ashley's grown up knowing love and support,” Cindy says. “She lost both her brother and her father at a young age and from that (she) values life very differently than most people her age.”
Coleman agrees that the tragedies suffered early on have shaped who she is today.

“I definitely know that my childhood has a lot to do with the thick skin I have now,” Ashley says. “My childhood was a tough one, but I would not change anything, because it has a lot to do with who I am today. Certain things made me grow up a lot faster and become independent at a young age. I grew to rely on myself and nobody else. It made me a very strong person mentally, and the physical toughness soon followed. I went through a lot as a kid, which makes it easier to endure the struggles I’m faced with as an adult.”

One of those struggles that Ashley faced was when she had a quadriceps injury and had to sit out for a couple of weeks. Suddenly she was faced with not being able to push and use her body the way she normally did.

“I basically had to sit out for a while and every time I tried to get back in it I would pull it again and it just kept getting worse and worse,” Ashley remembers. “That was the hardest for me to adjust to not being able to do physically what I knew I could do mentally. I have always been able to push my body but when I was actually not able to push myself any more was a pretty bad point.”

That challenge, like most in her life, was something that Ashley pushed through and the more she played the better she got. Ashley even earned her nickname—Big Cat.

“She is just one of those players that is bigger than everyone else and stronger than everyone else and I have a saying where they make a good play I will say it was like a cat, and I changed it to like a big cat (for Ashley),” Eastman says.

The next step

As Ashley’s time in Northern California wound down, she knew that she did not want to stop playing softball. She sent her skills tape to various schools, all with one characteristic in common—warm weather.

“I pretty much wanted an adventure,” Ashley says. “I looked for places next to a beach. I wanted to feel like I was on vacation.”

Out of all the schools that Ashley inquired about, Florida Institute of Technology was the best fit. It had warm weather, a good education and a full ride.

And so Ashley, who plans on becoming a personal trainer and is studying psychology, packed her bags and bat and set off for a completely new beginning, this time thousands of miles away. By now however, going solo is something she is used to and can draw strength from.

“I think what fuels me most is just being on my own,” Ashley says. “I may not be completely independent when it comes to certain things, but being so far away from family and friends, makes it seem that way. I have never been afraid to step outside my comfort zone, and that has made me a stronger person in the long run. First moving away to California, then here to Florida, I have never had an old friend or family member there with me to turn to or to rely on to get me motivated. I’ve always had to look within myself for things like that. I am the only person I have to answer to at the end of the day. If I don’t work hard or do the things I need to do, I don’t feel right. In a nutshell, I contribute a lot of my success to stepping outside that comfort zone; putting myself out there where I might be uncomfortable, but never allowing myself to take a step back—only forward. It has shown me what I’m made of and I take that confidence with me to the plate every day.”

Ashley is doing well in Florida, the third major layover in her life, on and off the playing field.

“I just received a letter from F.I.T. that Ashley made the dean's list,” Cindy Coleman says. “She's all about ‘you get out what you put into it.’ She has unrelenting stamina with a focus on her future. As a parent I couldn't ask for anymore. I am truly blessed.”

Florida Institute of Technology is enjoying a successful season with an overall record of 28-10 and even though Ashley is not playing as much as she might be used to she is still happy in Florida.

“This is my high point,” Ashley says of playing in Florida. “This is the first time where I am at a spot where I can recognize that how hard I have worked has gotten me here.”

The love you give comes back in the end.
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