For The Tribune
When the special award winners got together for a group photo at the end of Seymour’s softball awards program Monday night, Emily Bobb had trouble holding all the special honors she had received.
Coach Brian Personett announced Bobb as the Owls’ most valuable player for the second time and as a member of the Hoosier Hills all-conference first team for the third time.
The senior received a total of five special awards during the program that was conducted in the school cafeteria.
She also was named co-offensive player of the year, all-district and academic all-state honorable mention.
Bobb, who will play softball at Grace College beginning this fall, batted .446 this spring.
The other co-offensive player of the year was Faith Rebber, who batted .387 and hit .553 with runners in scoring position. She topped the team in RBIs with 29.
Personett announced Baylee Robinson and Lo Schmidt as co-recipients of the defensive award.
Chloe Wahl was named to the academic all-state team, and Claire Collett received honorable mention.
Macy Hall received the coaches award.
Hall suffered a knee injury prior to the start of season and did not get to play in any games, but Personett said she still was a valuable member of the team. Hall suffered a knee injury during the soccer sectional in October and spent all winter rehabilitating her knee to get ready for softball.
“As a coach, this is the kind of player you want to have around,” Personett said. “Macy’s second knee injury was pretty devastating. She took on more of a coaching role. She did an outstanding job of taking a negative and turning it into a positive. She took the high road.”
Personett announced the seniors, Shelby Stephens, Keia Blair, Bobb, Hall, Collett and Wahl, as co-winners of the mental attitude award.
Personett completed his fifth year as head coach of the Owls and said, “This is my favorite group of seniors to ever come through since I’ve been coach. We made several changes on conditioning in the winter, and they gave us everything they had. They had a 4.37 grade point average on a 4.0 scale. You parents should be proud of them.”
The Owls were 13-15 this season and lost 9-8 to Bedford North Lawrence in the sectional.
Personett said the team got off to a good start by beating Bedford North Lawrence, Columbus North and Jeffersonville early in the season.
“We had four games during the course of the year that we let get away,” he said. “We had some games where the other team would score a couple of runs, and then when we had to score to get back in the game we couldn’t score.
“We lost 6-2 to Floyd Central (April 28), and they were sectional champions. We upgraded our schedule. There were no days off.”
Junior varsity coach Zabrina Nicholson introduced members of her team and presented the offensive award to Anna Bullard, the defensive award to Faith Laiz and Tori Snook and the mental attitude award to Madi Brackemyre.