State title, school records lead to All-Bi-City awards for Glenwood

It was a season of records for the Glenwood softball team.

It won 50 games, a school record. Individually, junior pitcher McKenna Gillespie notched four school records, and Kirstin Reynolds set two more.

The result was the team’s second straight AISA state championship and a clean sweep of the Ledger-Enquirer All-Bi-City spring softball awards. Coach Dusty Perdue is the coach of the year, Gillespie the pitcher of the year and Reynolds player of the year.

It’s the second straight season Gillespie has been named pitcher of the year. Last year, her numbers were great. This year, they were even better.

She finished 36-4, pitching over 221 innings with a 1.46 ERA and setting a school record for strikeouts at 269. The 36 wins were also a school record.

“Just unbelievable,” coach Dusty Perdue said of her accomplishments. “She knew some of the school records, and she wanted to shoot for those. For her to have the season she had with 36 wins and only four losses and to go for the strikeout record, just unbelievable.”

Gillespie said she was proud of all of the numbers, but none of them were as important as winning a state championship. The two go hand in hand, though, and she credited her improvement mentally for the success.

One of those teammates, Reynolds, had just as much of an impact for the team.

Reynolds finished with a .443 batting average, a school-record 71 RBIs, 26 doubles, 14 home runs and a school record .995 fielding percentage. She was the state tournament MVP, among other numerous accolades.

When she joined the program as an eighth-grader, she was a third baseman. After former catcher Cailah Niles graduated, though, she moved behind the plate, and she’s glad she did.

“Getting behind the plate, I think, is when I fell in love with the game,” Reynolds said. “In catching, you have to stay in the game every single pitch. There’s no time to get down. It’s such a rush. There’s not one play you aren’t involved in.”

And she’s the right player for such a job, Perdue said.

“The offensive numbers were just astronomic, but she’s really just matured into a great all-around player,” he said.

As for Perdue, it’s another year of success for his program. He’s turned it into a bona fide powerhouse in AISA, and both he and the players hope that trend continues.

“They want a chance to do what we did in 2009, 2010 and 2011,” he said. “They want a chance to three-peat. Softball does not stop. They love softball. They want to be as good as they can be. They want that challenge, and I want that for them.”

Glenwood went 50-6 to go with its state championship this season. The 50 wins were a school record, but the six losses still give them something else to shoot for next season.

This story was originally published June 2, 2016 at 7:41 PM with the headline "State title, school records lead to All-Bi-City awards for Glenwood."