Ephrata softball coach retiring after giving back, forming connections

EPHRATA – The Ephrata Tigers softball coach, Heather Wood, is officially retiring after coaching since 2002. This season the Tigers softball team earned third in districts and made the state tournament after Wood earned her 250th career win with the team in April. 

“The reason you (become a coach) is because you’re giving back to your community, I was blessed with great coaches in my time, throughout my high school, rec league and my college, and just kind of giving back to what they did,” said Wood. “And you develop great relationships with the kids and see them outside of the academic world.” 

She said her decision to retire stemmed from a variety of factors, with the primary one being health-related. A year ago, Wood said she had knee replacement surgery, which took a lot out of her coaching this last season. 

“For my body, it was a lot harder than I thought,” she said. 

Mobility issues got in the way of giving the role what she wanted to give it. 

“Being young, you can demonstrate a lot of what you want them to do,” said Wood. “Then comes to this year and with me it was I couldn’t even run bases because I’m not able to and hitting, you can hit, but it’s the twisting it just kind of puts some pressure on your body.”  

On top of softball, she also coaches football cheer, wrestling, basketball and competition cheer, which meant she coached all three seasons of the school year, said Wood. This is something she had been doing for the past 14 years, which meant she wasn’t getting time to spend with family. 

“I’ve coached 21 seasons over 24 years and I just kind of need a break,” she said. 

Wood said she first started coaching softball in Quincy right after graduating from college, where she coached for about three years. Then she moved to Ephrata, where she took over the position of head coach in 2002. 

“It was a whole different world because I did slow-pitch all the way through high school and played fast-pitch through college, but that’s about all I experienced from it,” she said. “So, you’re learning how to coach those aspects of fast-pitch when you weren’t really in it for so long.” 

She said that the first year was a learning curve but also helped her in the future as she would have to prepare for a new team each season with players coming in with new skill sets.  

During her time as coach, she said she has seen both the sport and the team change drastically from year to year. She said in her first year they struggled on the pitching side, which lead to difficulty in games against teams who did have dominant pitchers. 

As time went on the team would have waves where another group of players would come in with summer and travel ball experience and have the pitching skills to compete. Softball in Ephrata is an ever-growing sport that evolves with each passing season and creates stronger players, she said. 

“It's changed to where people now understand the game and they’ve played the game enough,” said Wood. “Where back in the first couple years, we were just transitioning from slow pitch to fast pitch.” 

Wood plans on continuing her career as a cheer coach and helping build that program into the future. She said she still will continue supporting the softball team as much as she can even after her retirement. 

“I still have those connections with the kids,” she said.  

    Tigers’ head coach Heather Wood gets the cooler dumped on her by the softball players after she earned her 250th career win this spring. Wood coached for Quincy before heading to Ephrata to be the head coach for 23 years.
  

    Head coach Heather Wood talks to the Tigers softball players before they go out onto the field. Wood said she has seen a lot of change in the team in her time as the head coach.
  

    Tigers’ head coach Heather Wood talks to one of her players as they prepare to go up to bat. Wood plans to support the softball team even after her retirement.
  

    Heather Wood fist bumps one of her players after hitting a home run. Wood said one of the challenges when starting as the head coach was figuring out the differences between slow-pitch and fast-pitch softball.