Phil Campbell softball setting standards higher for 2025 campaign

After two wins in 2023 and nine wins in 2024, the Phil Campbell High School varsity softball program is aiming to continue that improvement in 2025, using the upcoming campaign as another stepping stone to a consistent and successful program.

“We’re really looking forward to having a fantastic season,” Phil Campbell head coach Jason Lindsey told the Franklin Free Press.

“The type of ball we’re trying to instill at Phil Campbell, these girls have been in it now,” Lindsey added. “They know what we expect of them, they have the hunger to win, and the work ethic they have is phenomenal.”

This year the Lady Bobcats have set their aspirations higher, working in the offseason to prepare themselves to achieve their set goals.

“Our first goal is to try to make it to a subregional—or the regional,” Lindsey said. “That’s a goal all the kids set for themselves in the summer.”

The 2025 PCHS roster is a fairly young one as the Lady Bobcats have just three seniors—Siddalee Rogers, Mia Ambrosio, and Kadence Taylor—and one junior. Phil Campbell’s senior class may be relatively small, but Lindsey said the group’s leadership ability could prove a big difference.

“Each one of them play hard, they play loud, and they don’t care to be heard in the dugout,” the head coach said. “They’re not belittling, but they lead and they tell people what they see and what they need to do.

“They did that last year when we had just one senior, but they’re just good leaders. They lead by example. They’re there working all the time. Some leaders are silent but these three aren’t afraid to speak their mind, and that’s a good thing with how they use it,” he added. “The rest of the team respects them, looks up to them, and follows them real well.”

Not lacking in leadership ability, the Lady Bobcats don’t lack experience either. While PCHS doesn’t have a ton of upperclassmen, it’s not like the Lady Bobcats don’t have innings logged on the field. What Phil Campbell does lack in total years of experience Lindsey is optimistic the team makes up for in ability.

“We just had one senior last year, so our team is pretty much intact in terms of who’s coming back,” he said. “While we’re still young, we’re a year older. It wasn’t a heavy turnover, so the experience is there.

“Over half my team will be sophomores, freshmen, and maybe an underclassman or two,” Lindsey added. “But they’re athletic, they’re smart, they play the game well. We just need to learn to finish some games this year.”

Finishing games—“growing up”—Lindsey said, has been one of the focal points for the Lady Bobcats this offseason. Detail to “the small things,” Lindsey believes, will help PCHS to wrap games up in its favor.

“Last season there were 10 ball games that if we just finish the ball game, we’re looking at a totally different outcome to our season,” Lindsey said.

“We’ve been working on the small things, the small details. How to get out of pressure situations, how to make sure that things don’t snowball on us and we can finish a game. We’re close to winning, we’ve just gotta grow up in that area,” he added. “It all comes down to can we mature enough to finish in those situations and win those games we should win.”

Phil Campbell will be aided in its efforts by the return of both starting pitchers from last season, sophomores Addi James and Shiloh Madden. Last season James was a Franklin Free Press All-County Honorable Mention pitcher, while Madden was a First Team All-County utility player.

In the circle, James and Madden have distinct skill sets that Lindsey said can confuse opposing batters.

“They’re two different styles of pitchers and that’s a great thing about it,” he said. “If you have pitchers with the same speed, same pitchers, same delivery, it doesn’t throw anybody off much. If you have the same mechanics, you’re just mirroring. But these two pitch different, they deliver different, they have different pitches.

“It’s nice to be able to pitch one for three or four innings and then you can bring the other one in to close it if she can. But you’ve got options with them, and that’s just from the growth we’ve had in a year’s time.”

In addition to his two aces Lindsey added he has some more arms he can throw into the mix, as well.

“Our strength this year is gonna be our defense, our pitching,” Lindsey said.

“We’ve got both pitchers back but I’ve got some young pitchers playing JV that will come up and pitch for us from time to time,” he added. “(James and Madden) pitch to win games and whoever’s on or (depending on) whoever we’re playing, that’s who we put out there. But I've got two younger girls, a seventh and an eighth grader, too—Myah Hamilton, a seventh grader, and Tinsley Pierce, an eighth grader. So, we’ve built something that wasn’t there before I got here, and that’s a staff of girls who can pitch.”

Offensively the Lady Bobcats may be a little weaker, especially at the beginning of the campaign. Phil Campbell has several multisport athletes who haven’t been participants in much of the team’s preseason prep and may need some time to get into a rhythm on the diamond. That, of course, could determine how at least some of the Lady Bobcats’ season starts.

“We’re a small school so a lot of our athletes play multiple sports, so we’ve worked with 50 percent of our team or less,” Lindsey said. “I think that’s gonna affect us more offensively.

“Things are gonna depend on what our pitching does and when our hitting clicks. It could click the first game; they could step right off the basketball court and click—or they could take a few weeks to knock the rust off their bats,” he added. “That’s gonna be the tale to our season.”

However the tale of the 2025 season plays out, Lindsey wants the upcoming campaign to be another building block in the program he’s constructing at Phil Campbell. That means winning, of course, but it also means making the Lady Bobcats softball family one students want to be a member of.

“When I first came (to PCHS) all I heard was that we only had enough (players) for one team. Last year we had two teams and this year we’ve got two teams. That’s kinda rounding off a bit but that’s simply because it’s a program now. There are expectations and it’s hard work,” Lindsey said. “Softball’s not an easy sport. It’s a hard sport. You’re on an island a lot it seems, especially when you make an error or strikeout or make a bad pitch. You need the girls on the team that have been through it to get the girls who aren’t playing out, and that’s what we’ve been able to do.

“I want these kids to enjoy this sport; to build a family; to have a team where 10 years down the road they look at what they did as a softball program,” he added. “You know, winning is fun and losing is not fun. But trophies, they sit in a case and are great to talk about, but number one we want to build a family where these kids love playing the game everyday; where they hate their season is over because they can’t play the game anymore. To me, that’s just as successful a season as winning every game or winning a championship.

“Championships are what you want and what you strive for and they’re important at the varsity level, but if you don’t miss the game then, to me, you don’t have a program that’s worth playing for. You’ve gotta build a program that you hate you have to hang up your cleats at the end of the season because you enjoy playing so much. And if we can have that program, build that environment, get kids out to play and build that family, that’s success.”