The Whitby baseball player who turned heads with some impressive catches after being told girls can’t play baseball is back from an all girls tournament in the States, where she smashed the ball and sat down batters.
Ashlynn Jolicoeur made an impression south of the border both on and off the field.
“I really liked the pitching part,” said Jolicoeur, who plays second base for the Whitby Chiefs. “I got five strikeouts and I pitched two times and I also liked making new friends.”
“This was her first tournament playing with live pitching and she got to pitch a couple times,” said Dan Therien, Ashlynn’s father. “I thought she did great; her coaches and the families said how well she did. In her last at bat she ended up getting a home run.”
The eight-year-old played in five games with the San Francisco Bay Sox, who embraced her as one of their own.
“We have some kids on our team that are very welcoming, great kids, great hearts, and I think within the first five to 10 minutes they’re running around playing catch, doing their thing,” said Jandro Alcantar, head coach opf San Francisco Bay Sox Head Coach.
“They treated her like she’s been part of the team forever,” Therien recalled. “Everybody was so great, like the coaches and the girls on the team and the families were awesome.”
Her coach, Jandro Alcantar, has seen the video of Ashlynn making some incredible catches and over the weekend the duo developed a bond.
“That joy of playing baseball and the willingness to do something that you’ve never done before, like that was something that impressed me right off the bat,” said Alcantar.
“I like Jandro because he gave me a lot of advice,” Jolicoeur said.
“You can tell how much love he has for baseball and for all the girls that are playing,” said Therien.
Over 350 girls took the field in the Baseball For All tournament, and while it was a short experience, it’s one Ashlynn and the Bay Sox hope to do all over again next year.
“Once a Bay Sox, always a Bay Sox. I let her know that if she wants to and she’s available, she’s always got the Bay Sox uniform so she can come and play with us,” said Alcantar.
“They signed the home run ball, for the home run she hit and gave her a uniform and everything else. It was a touching moment for her,” said Therien.
When she’s not playing with her Whitby team or going to tournaments, Ashlynn is honing her skills at her local diamond, with the hope of one day representing her country on the world stage.
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