Lady Leps’ Parshall earning national attention
Bailey Parshall has made quite the name for herself over the years on the mound as a talented softball pitcher.
After all, the Belle Vernon Area junior verballed to Penn State during the summer of 2014, in between her eighth grade and freshman school years before throwing one high school pitch.
Now the southpaw is making a name for herself nationally, and Tuesday night, she was named as the 32nd ranked junior in the country in FloSoftball’s Hot 100 in the Class of 2018.
“I am pretty honored,” she said in her ever-quiet tone. “I worked really hard over the summer and it has paid off.”
Parshall is excited to get this season started, and understandably so.
She has been named first-team All-State for her accomplishments after both her freshman and sophomore seasons.
As a freshman, she went 21-2 with 214 strikeouts while hitting .418 while leading BVA to the school’s second-ever WPIAL Class AAA softball championship.
Last season, she had a 0.81 ERA, set a school record with 18 strikeouts against eventual PIAA AAA champion Yough, and hit .431.
Parshall, who has a screwball, curve ball, rise ball and change-up to complement her fastball, will be working on yet another pitch this winter.
“I want to learn a drop ball while making my other pitches spin better,” she said in her patented humble tone.
Parshall did not hesitate when asked about her goals for the upcoming season.
“I want to try my best on the mound, get my strikeout count higher, improve my hitting and my batting average.”
Over the summer, Parshall plays for the Ohio Outlaws travel organization.
She is on the Outlaws PA Premier team and this past summer, it played in the top tournaments in the country, including the PGF (Premier Girls Fast pitch) Nationals in Huntington Beach, California, the Boulder Independence Day Tournament in Colorado, the Team NJ tournament in New Jersey and the DeMarini Invitational in Chicago.
Parshall went 14-4-1 in those tournaments and led the team to a pair of fifth-place finishes in Colorado and New Jersey.
This is the second time Parshall has made the FloSoftball Hot 100 in the Class of 2018 list as she was ranked 82nd headed into her freshman season.
There was no list a year ago or Parshall almost certainly would have made that one as well.