Who is she? Lacey Middlebrooks, a former standout pitcher and hitter for the Tulsa Golden Hurricane.
What is she known for? Middlebrooks began her career at Minnesota before transferring to Tulsa and finishing the final three seasons of her career with the Golden Hurricane. A dual-threat player, Middlebrooks appeared in eighty-four games in the pitching circle and posted a 45-14 overall record, along with a 2.21 ERA and a .218 opponent’s batting average. At the plate, primarily batting as a designated player or simply for herself in games that she pitched, Middlebrooks posted a career .296 batting average with thirteen home runs and seventy-six RBI. She earned a pair of all-Region honors, in her junior and senior seasons, and was named the Conference USA Co-Pitcher of the Year in 2012.
Here’s something interesting… In 2012, during her junior season at Tulsa, Middlebrooks was a part of one the coolest happenings in sports. Her older brother, Will, a Major League Baseball player, then for the Boston Red Sox, hit his first MLB home run against the Baltimore Orioles. It was a grand slam that tied the ballgame at five runs each. 1,200 miles away, Lacey and the Golden Hurricane were playing UAB in the final conference series of the regular season. In the sixth inning, Lacey hit a three-run shot of her own that broke a scoreless tie and wound up being the difference in that ballgame.
After the games, respectively, staff members for both the Red Sox and Tulsa softball would discover that the brother/sister duo had each hit their home runs nearly simultaneously; the farthest estimation was that the pair of longballs had been hit no more than one minute apart from each other!
Quotable quote: [giving advice to the current generation of softball athletes]“Constantly be a sponge to everyone and everything around you: teammates, opponents, coaches, teachers, and be present in all situations. Be open to learning new perspectives and methods of implementing drills or techniques into the enhancement of your craft… The moment we stop learning is the moment you need to find something else to do.”
What is she up to now? After spending time as an assistant coach at Buffalo; Northeastern State; and Columbus State, earlier this year, Lacey accepted the head coaching position at Pittsburg High School in Pittsburg, Texas. In accepting the position, she said that it was “an opportunity to build a program at a great school.” In addition to her softball coaching duties, she serves as an assistant volleyball coach and teaches English at the school.
Keep up: You can find Lacey on Twitter @lacembrooks.
