With a few weeks now passed the finish of the 2023 softball season for the West Central Valley Wildcats, here’s a look at the 2023 postseason awards that were released a couple days ago for West Central Valley. Starting with awards for the team as a whole, Addilynn Richter won the Coaches Award for the 2023 season. Meleah Speichinger took home the Newcomer of the Year award. She was a freshman on this years roster and had a pretty good outing for the Wildcats this season. She finished the year with her batting average above the .300 mark. The most improved award went to Lillian Gilbert, another freshman for the Wildcats. She was on the team starting as an 8th grader last season and was able to increase her batting average from .324 a year ago, to .397 this year. I could only imagine what the numbers will be for Gilbert, going into her sophomore year next season. Continuing on, the standout senior from this past season for the Wildcats, Marissa Hagen took home the teams most valuable player award for the season. Hagen had strong numbers for the Wildcats all season long. The team on-base percentage award went to Kinsey Alt. She led West Central Valley will a staggering .478 on base percentage.

For the West Central conference awards for West Central Valley, Marissa Hagen also won 2nd team pitcher. She had good numbers on the mound as well with a 3.46 ERA in 198 innings pitched. Honorable mentions for conference awards also included Lillian Gilbert and Kinsey Alt.

Marissa Hagen did also take home her third award of the season, as she won all district IGCA Southwest Iowa. Zoey Dickson also took home the award for the Wildcats. Lastly, for the final award given to a Wildcat on the season, Zoey Dickson took home all-state 3rd team. Zoey just finished her sophomore season and was tied for the highest batting average on the team as it sits at .463. A major round of applause is needed for all these girls on incredible accomplishments throughout the 2023 season. For each returning player, they will look to build upon this going into 2024.