Hoos Hitting Their Stride at the Plate

By Jeff White (jwhite@virginia.edu)
VirginiaSports.com

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — In its breakthrough 2024 season, the University of Virginia softball team won 34 games, two of them in the NCAA tournament. UVA did so without the benefit of a powerful offense.

The Cavaliers, who advanced to the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2010, collected plenty of timely hits last year, but the team batting average was an underwhelming .246. Only one UVA player finished the season hitting above .290: Jade Hylton.

“Last year we really relied on the pitching, and I think we really put a lot of pressure on our pitchers,” senior center-fielder Kelly Ayer said. “This year, it’s just nice knowing that our offense actually has their backs.”

The Wahoos’ offensive turnaround this season has been stunning. With five regular-season games remaining, No. 25 Virginia (33-14 overall, 13-8 ACC) is hitting .316.

In 2024, the Hoos totaled 36 home runs. Led by Hylton, a junior from Martinsville, they’ve belted 57 homers this year, a single-season record for the program, and their 261 RBI ranks second all-time at Virginia. UVA finished with 200 RBI last season.

“I think it’s a tale-of-two-years type thing,” head coach Joanna Hardin said. “This year the pitching has been a little up and down, so when the offense puts up the runs, that kind of run support, it definitely takes a little bit of pressure off the pitching staff.”

With 15 homers, Hylton has tied the single-season program record set by Lacy Smith in 2019, and her 39 career home runs are the most ever by a Cavalier.

Five Cavaliers have hit at least six homers apiece this season: Hylton, sophomore Macee Eaton (10), junior M.C. Eaton (nine), sophomore Bella Cabral (eight) and senior Sarah Coon (six).

Of the players with at least 90 at-bats this season, six are hitting .300 or better: Cabral (.396), Hylton (.382), Ayer (.340), Macee Eaton (.333), senior Kailyn Jones (.333) and senior Sydney Hartgrove (.300).

Their batting averages last season: .263 for Cabral, .335 for Hylton, .236 for Ayer, .211 for Eaton, .238 for Jones, and .067 for Hartgrove.

“Last year we kind of had a struggle with our hitting,” Cabral said. “We weren’t in the groove of things. But I think now that we had that year under our belt, we’re like, ‘We can compete with the best.’ It’s been a lot easier this year.”

Eaton said that “personally, I pressed a lot my freshman year. I tried to perform too much. So this year, I know what I’m capable of doing. I know I can perform when the team needs me to, and just having that confidence and just ease on the play has helped me a lot.”

UVA struck out an average of 4.7 times per game in 2024. That average has dipped to 3.7 this season. Moreover, after drawing 142 walks in 2024, Virginia batters have already drawn 149 this year.

So what’s behind this dramatic improvement at the plate?

“First things first, I think they’re working their tails off,” associate head coach Jeff Tylka said Friday night after Virginia pounded out 10 hits in an 8-2 win over Louisville at Palmer Park.

“They are doing everything we ask of them. They’re trying. And whether they succeed with it right away or it’s a struggle right away, they trust it. And I think that’s a credit to them.”

Tylka, who works with UVA’s hitters, is in his second year on Hardin’s staff. When he arrived in Charlottesville, Tylka said, he focused first on seeing “where some of the holes are, how do they make their mistakes, what gets them out, where are they successful. So we did a lot of that the first year, and then the second year you start to learn about them. You learn how they communicate and how they ask questions and things of that nature.”

From his father, who coached multiple sports, Tylka said he learned “that every kid is different. Some of them need a hug, some of them need a kick in the butt, some of them need a challenge, some of them need just unconditional confidence-building, and I think that’s the biggest piece for our relationship with all of them: just learning what they need to be successful and then learning how to communicate in ways that can allow them to get the material and then take it and run.

“A lot of it was, I think, you come in and you tell them, ‘I trust you, and if they throw you this certain pitch and you strike out on it, I’m not going to be mad.’ And that took a couple months, because it would happen, and then they’d come off the field and they’re looking for you to be upset or angry, and I’m like, ‘You’re doing exactly what we’re asking.’ ”

Early in her college career, Ayer said, “I dwelled a lot on the failures, and I always looked to the negative instead of looking at the next pitch, looking ahead and learning from my mistakes.”

She’s changed her approach under Tylka. “Coach T has really helped a lot,” Ayer said. “I think what’s big with him is that he is very cool-headed, and I think that’s something we needed. He is there to calm us down in big moments, and I feel like he just always knows the right thing to say right before a big moment and knows each of us very well. He’s just someone that I really trust.”

With some players, Tylka said, “you just have to take the leash off and be like, ‘I just need you to swing. It’s OK. Just go swing. We can rein it in once you get comfortable doing what you’re doing and finding your timing.’ But I think another big piece is just letting them know that, hey, we have trust and faith in you to go do your job and just give it your all.”

In the second year under a coach, Hardin said, players usually get more comfortable. “And then I think for Jeff, he’s a learner and he’s a teacher, so he wants to learn our team and our players. I think he’s just done a really good job of adapting to what they need and taking his expertise and what he knows about hitting and then applying it directly to the players that are here.”

The Cavaliers’ improvement at the plate, Hardin said, is “a testament to our players. They want to grow and get better. They’re comfortable and they’re confident, which are two really, really big factors. I don’t know that their swings themselves have changed that much. I think their mentality has tightened up, and I think our decisions are better. When we decide to go, we’re going with more authority, and that’s just a direct reflection of Jeff’s stick-to-it-ness and his adaptability, and it comes from being a teacher.”

A former head coach at Loyola University in Chicago, Tylka came to UVA from Penn State, where he spent three seasons as hitting coach.

“He’s the best,” Cabral said. “He caters to our type of hitting or our certain style of hitting. He doesn’t try and make all of us hit one specific way. We’re all different hitters. I adjusted pretty well when I first came in and he’s just been amazing. He listens, he helps us with anything we need. Any time we want to come up here and hit extra, he’s always here.”

Tylka deflects such praise. He pointed to the contributions of Leah Narkevic, who’s in her first year as the team’s strength and conditioning coach.

“She’s the biggest difference,” Tylka said. “It’s not the hitting coach. It’s our strength coach. We are stronger, which allows us to be balanced and more control and everything else. She has made a huge difference, and I think all of our kids would say that.”

Narkevic has “had a huge impact,” Macee Eaton said. “I feel a lot stronger this year. I’ve hit a lot more home runs this year, so that definitely had an impact.”

Under Narkevic, Cabral said, the players are “doing a lot more heavy lifts, like a lot of back squats, a lot of dead lifts.”

At 5 p.m. Tuesday, Virginia meets James Madison in Harrisonburg. Then comes an ACC series with No. 15 Stanford this weekend in Palo Alto, Calif., followed by UVA’s regular-season finale, April 30 against Liberty at Palmer Park.

In junior right-hander Eden Bigham (14-7, 2.28 ERA), the Hoos have one of the ACC’s top pitchers, and the staff ERA is a superb 2.76.

Virginia’s pitchers had a combined ERA of 2.63 last season. In 2024, however, they couldn’t always count on the run support they’re receiving this year.

“It’s great knowing that we’re always in any game, no matter how many runs we’re behind,” Ayer said. “I know that our offense has the ability to always come back. And I always go in confident knowing that we will win any game no matter how far behind we are. I have full confidence in our whole offense that we can fight back.”

Cabral said: “I think it’s just confidence. We trust our teammates. If we don’t get it done, our teammates behind us are going to get it done. So that allows us to be free at the plate and go play how we want to.”

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