Three County Softball Players Leave Their Marks on Game

Their paths and personalities may be different, and each brings a different element to a softball team, but Christy Robitaille, Geney Orris and Kelsey Kollen have found their way into the record book.

In four-year careers, each has made her mark on softball in Orange County.

Woodbridge’s Robitaille, a pitcher, tied the county record for victories. Brea Olinda’s Orris set a Southern Section record for home runs. Mater Dei’s Kollen shattered the section record for hits.

Kollen, a senior who will attend Michigan, has started every game during four years for high-profile Mater Dei.

“She’s the type of kid who enjoys the limelight, the challenges,” Monarch Coach Doug Myers said. “Whereas some freshmen come in a little overwhelmed, that wasn’t the case with Kelsey. She’s been the model of consistency. She wasn’t intimidated. The bigger the challenge, the better she seemed to perform.”

Kollen, as a freshman, had seven hits in two games against Marina pitcher Marcy Crouch, the county player of the year, including a three-for-three performance in the title game, which Mater Dei lost.

“I’ve coached the last 15 years, and I can’t ever remember a girl who hated losing more,” Myers said.

Kollen has played a major role in helping Mater Dei--seeded No. 1 in the Division I playoffs--achieve its team goals, which include a section title in 1996.

She crushed the section record for hits in a career (206) by hitting safely 232 times. She surpassed the mark set by Covina Charter Oak’s Julie Smith (1982-86).

Kollen’s 67 hits in 1996 is also a section record. A left-handed batter with great speed, she prefers the soft slap (a hard bunt), a bouncing slap (chopper in the air) and hard slap (line drive or ground ball through the hole).

“I always try to be in a good mood and with a positive attitude--that’s the first key to success,” said Kollen, who had two older sisters play at Mater Dei. “You have to have the right outlook to win. Being positive, always sticking with your team and yourself, and having confidence is a way to have a good attitude. . . . By not getting down on myself, that helped me.”

Kollen broke the section record April 15 against Camarillo, the same day her sister, Candace, 22, a senior second baseman at Ohio State, broke the Big Ten record for hits in a career. Her other sister, Paige, is at Sonoma State but doesn’t play.

With her win Friday, Robitaille (83-15) matched the mark of Kennedy’s Cheryl Longeway (1988-91) for the county victory record.

Robitaille, like Kollen, has played with a high-profile program, Woodbridge. Though she has pitched in the section finals each of her three seasons (winning twice)--and Woodbridge is seeded No. 1 in Division II this season--she has never been the county’s most notable pitcher. In successive years, she has been in the shadows of Marina’s Crouch (a senior), Mater Dei’s Marissa Young (a freshman) and Pacifica’s Amanda Freed (a junior).

Robitaille has a penchant for letting the defense do the work behind her and not racking up huge strikeout totals. But the bottom line is winning. For example, she has never lost in high school or travel ball to Santa Maria Righetti’s Jocelyn Forest.

Forest, along with Freed, is considered one the nation’s three best prep pitchers. Robitaille beat Forest in last year’s Division II title game and took home a 2-0 victory. It was Woodbridge’s second section title in three consecutive championship games.

Robitaille didn’t smile or celebrate after the victory. She walked directly into the dugout and put on a jacket.

“She said she had a [travel] game to pitch the next day and didn’t want to risk injury while everyone was jumping on each other,” said her father, Steve, who asked her about it on the drive home. “She’s very matter-of-fact. She knows what her job is. If she wins, it’s great. If she loses, she’s her own worst critic. She is a perfectionist. If she wins 1-0 and feels like she didn’t pitch well, she’ll come home and will feel terrible.”

After beating eighth-ranked El Toro for the 10th consecutive time in four years on May 6, Robitaille called her performance mediocre.

She had just pitched a no-hitter.

“I’ve seen her smile more this season than any other--once every three or four games,” her father said. “She’s not there to have a good time, she’s there to win.

“It’s like she doesn’t have the enjoyment, but she has the satisfaction. She’s probably the most intense person I’ve ever seen. She wants things more than anybody I’ve ever seen.”

Robitaille will pitch at Cal State Fullerton; Orris, a pitcher and outfielder, will play at Nevada Las Vegas.

A powerful hitter who Myers once said could hit a home run swinging a Coke bottle, Orris has 30 home runs.

When she hit her 29th, surpassing the mark set by Glendora St. Lucy’s Jenny Dalton (1992), Orris was relieved.

But a week later, it was discovered that another player, Montclair Prep’s Tamra Freedman hit her 29th homer in 1997, but her school had not reported it to the section office to have it acknowledged as a record.

Orris shrugged it off: “I guess I’ll just have to hit another one.”

She did, on the last day of the season.

Orris said her father, Gary, told her to set her goals ridiculously high when she entered high school.

“Set your goals higher and push yourself more,” she said, “and you’ll get more than you would have been able to accomplish otherwise.”

She has has yet to put her feat in perspective.

“To me, it’s not that big of a deal because it’s something I do every day,” Orris said. “I’m known to be a power hitter, that’s what I’m supposed to do, so I’m just doing my job.”