Local softball player Jessica Vest earns national title at elite
ASA tournament
HOLLISTER
The Amateur Softball Association’s Gold National Championship is, well, a pretty big deal. Just ask any softball player.
But winning the 18-and-under tournament, which comprises a who’s who of club softball teams from around the country for a 64-team playoff, well, that’s just about as big as it gets at the amateur level.
“It’s like the biggest thing other than a college championship or the Olympics,” said San Benito High junior shortstop Jessica Vest, who recently helped clog the left side of the infield for her club team, Sorcerer Gold-Phil. “This is the highest we can go in softball, other than college, so it was really big to win.”
Vest, who started and played in all seven games at shortstop for Sorcerer Gold, and even played in every inning but two, assisted the Vallejo club softball team to a perfect 7-0 record at the Gold National Championship in Oklahoma City earlier this month, and helped Sorcerer Gold outscore its opponents by a 29-3 margin en route to the coveted national title.
The magnitude of such an accomplishment didn’t become clear for Vest until she was driving home with her family. Somewhere in the Midwest, it finally hit her.
“When we drove home (from Oklahoma), then it sunk in,” Vest said. “It was kind of like, ‘Wow.'”
And Vest’s summer was a whirlwind that didn’t appear it would include a trip to nationals, let alone a national title.
With her highest finish at the ASA tournament coming when she was competing in the 12-and-under age group – she was a member of the Salinas Storm, which took 19th that year – Vest had been recently playing for the California Grapettes, a club softball team based out of Stockton.
But like so many of the 18-and-under club teams from across the nation, the Grapettes were unable to qualify to the 64-team bracket this year, which officially ended the club season for those players involved, Vest included.
However, the ASA allows club teams, which remain alive for a national championship, to sign players from out-of-contention teams, as long as all parties involved agree. And Vest was the lone “pick-up player” for Sorcerer Gold, a team anchored by former Mitty pitching standout, and now Oklahoma University freshman, Keilani Ricketts.
“She’s really good,” said Vest, who easily showed off her hitting prowess at the 64-team tourney, and who will likely join Ricketts in the near future; Vest made a verbal commitment to Oklahoma last year.
“A lot of the girls didn’t know me,” added Vest, who only had about three practices with Sorcerer Gold before heading to Oklahoma City, “but bonding with them, it was easier than I thought.”
In the championship game against the Gold Coast Hurricanes, a club team based out of Plantation, Fla., which won the Gold National Championship last year, Vest went 2 of 3 at the plate and scored a pair of runs in Sorcerer Gold’s 3-1 win.
It is the first national championship for the Vallejo club team.
“I was just playing,” Vest said. “But we had a good run and ended up winning.
“Not too many kids have a plaque that says they won the 18-Gold Nationals.”
