By Rick Teverbaugh
April 16, 2008 01:02 am
—
ANDERSON — “She’s a gamer” is a phrase often heard about Highland senior Stormy Holder.
The ultimate question that follows is, “Which game?”
Holder is finishing up her senior season and her career as a three-sport athlete. She is a vital part of the school’s volleyball, basketball and softball programs.
Her favorite of the three?
“By far it is softball,” Holder said. “Basketball had more drama this season. Softball is more relaxing. I love all of my teammates. We are so close and we’ve all worked so hard.”
Holder pointed to the examples set by Amanda Ockomon and Ashley Hogue in her formative softball years. “They set the bar for how to play for the team,” Holder said.
Stormy’s father, Doug, is the head coach of her softball team and was an assistant with the basketball squad. He understands why she fanned out her athletic interest over three sports instead of dialing in on one.
“As she was growing up, her favorite sport was always the one that was in season,” he said.
Even though many of her opponents concentrate on a single sport, it doesn’t faze her. “I feel like I can compete with anybody,” she said. “It really doesn’t bother me.”
Her athletic competition goes even beyond the school year.
“I played basketball and softball every summer,” Holder said. “It takes a toll on my body. I can’t imagine if I’ll be able to walk when I’m 80. It just seems like I’m worn out all of the time.”
An ankle injury suffered in basketball this past season was easily her most serious over the last four years. “I was out for quite a while with that one,” she said. “I was on crutches. The ankle was fractured in three places. I was a little worried about coming back.”
Her worries were well founded considering she’s a shortstop. “I’m always pushing off one ankle or another in both directions,” Holder said. But the ankle has held up through the season without incident.
She also has few problems in playing on a team with her father as the coach.
“My dad and I are real close,” she said. “Most of the time when I’m out there I just call him ‘Holder’ or ‘Coach Holder.’ If there’s something he has to tell me that he thinks I might not take well, he’ll have (assistant coach) Mike Lee tell me. But, seriously, he knows he can tell me anything.”
“As she’s gotten older, it’s gotten easier for her to deal with the fact that I’m the coach when we’re on the field and I’m her father when I’m at home,” Doug Holder said. “I don’t talk to her about sports at home unless she asks me something.”
But he’s glad that she’s on his team and in his family. “She’s an inspirational leader,” he said. “I couldn’t ask for more out of her as a player or a daughter.”
Not much more could be asked of her as a student, either, though keeping up grades in the midst of never-ending athletics isn’t easy.
“My expectations are straight A’s,” Holder said. “I try to stay up on my schoolwork and not get behind. Yet I still stay up sometimes until 1 or 2 a.m. just to get things done.”
The choice to compete in three sports could also be hampering her ability to get college scholarship offers. She wants to go into nursing with the focus being pediatrics.
“I had planned on going to Huntington (University),” Holder said. “But they were offering me about half a scholarship to play both basketball and softball. Now I may go to Ball State and try to walk on in softball.”
For now, the focus is on the rest of the softball season. The Scots are 4-3, but two of those defeats are at the hands of No. 1-ranked Pendleton Heights by a combined total of five runs. They could play the Arabians one more time in the sectional.
“We know there are things we did wrong against them,” Holder said. “I think we are all up for the challenge to play against them.”
Copyright © 1999-2008 cnhi, inc.