JOPLIN, Mo. — Coming off a really good season in 2022, the Joplin Lady Eagles softball team brings back an extremely talented squad into 2023.

Eight girls hit to the tune of 156 RBIs. They’ll be back with the same firepower this season.

Senior Third Baseman Bailey Ledford explains the expectations for this season.

“Just building off of our success from last year and we’re just trying to get better and digging deep. And at practices, we really don’t take them light, we put in the work every day.”

That’ll include names to the likes of Bailey Ledford and Abby Lowery.

Junior Centerfielder Abby Lowery said, “We want to do better than what we did last year. Like that’s the goal. We had a goal to finish with because a lot of our games we wanted to finish and we didn’t get to do that. But this year I believe we’re going to do that and I want us to do that. And a lot of like we all agreed that we’re going to do that.”

Ava Wolf and Caelyn Bobski will take on the pitching responsibilities. Coach Schneider will look to rely on his young pitching staff to come through.

“This is a different team. We’ve come back with more experience, but you know, we’ve got some newer pitchers in the circle that have been working hard. I think our big thing is just wanting to finish, You know, that was something that the girls put out there that we wanted to make sure that we finish everything we do, whether it be the pitch, the at bat, the game.” head coach Brenden Schneider says on this year’s team dynamic.

Joplin’s season will kick-off this weekend in Aurora when they compete in the Aurora Kick-Off Classic on August 25th and 26th.