LAKEWOOD, Colo. — Senior day came a bit early for the Alameda softball team.
"It's always going to be special, but it's nerve wracking," head coach Juanito Reyes said. "It's the first home game of the season."
A decorated neutral field on a hot September day is not the norm for this kind of event, but then again, that fits the theme of the year 2020.
"I guess it's kind of weird to be at another field for our senior day, and it's our first home game and not our last home game," senior pitcher Brooke Baca said.
None of those factors rained on her father Dominic's parade. He was just proud to see his daughter pitch another season for the pirates and walk her down the third base line with a dozen roses.
"It's just excitement," he said. "It's just an honor for them to do senior day, and I'm glad they did it at the beginning of the season just in case COVID shuts everything down."
Coach Reyes said it took a lot of planning to put together these preventative measures, but it was worth it.
"I ran it by my athletic director and he agreed, let's do it at the beginning of the season in case everything gets shut down like it did last season. We can go out with a bang."
Brooke Baca will definitely go out with a bang. She's carrying this momentum into a softball scholarship to Lamar Community College next season.
"I'm sad that it's my last home game, or my last first home game, but I think I'm ready to move on and do bigger things and go to college and play softball," she said. "I've always wanted to play college softball, so I'm accomplishing my dreams right now."
Dominic said it was a load off of the family's shoulders to know that his daughter would be playing for at least two more years and would have some of her education paid for by the school.
"We always wondered how we were going to pay for college. We have another daughter at UNC right now and it's a struggle and student loans are crazy," he said. "It just means a lot for her. All of the hard work she did is finally paying off."
Baca is the only Pirate in her graduating class to earn a scholarship, and is also the only one in her four years of playing to do so. However, Reyes said he's proud of the women each and every one of these seniors have become.
"The thing with Brooke is, she wants to play. She wants to play all of the time. All of these other girls that weren't fortunate enough to get scholarships, they're going to be great in life."
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