From the nanosecond Paige Collings connected with the pitch, everyone knew it was gone. As it sailed over the wall, only one doubt remained: would the softball injure an unsuspecting driver on I-76?
“You could definitely tell by the sound,” says Drexel Coach Kim Camara. “It was one of those things that kept rising and rising. It didn’t just clear the fence. It was monstrous. And pretty awesome to see.”
The towering home run over Penn’s version of the fabled Green Monster, nestled right along the Schuylkill Expressway, might have been Collings’ signature shot, but it was anything but a fluke. During her first three seasons she blasted 20, putting her just five short of the all-time school record as she enters her senior season.
“It feels so smooth and pure,” she says of a perfect power stroke. “It’s definitely one of the best feelings in the world.”
Few Drexel athletes have traveled farther to wear the blue and gold. A native of British Columbia, Collings grew up in the Vancouver suburb of Delta aspiring for success in either soccer or her country’s collective obsession, ice hockey. She only played softball because her two older sisters, whom she emulated, did.
“I was always at the ballpark with them, and I just picked up a ball and bat and started playing,” she says. “Honestly, at first I didn’t really like it that much. I stayed with it because my sisters did it and I wanted to be like them. It wasn’t until I was 12 or 13 that I actually started to like the sport.”
It certainly took a liking to her. Collings’ powerful bat was evident to Camara when she first saw the player on a highlight film. After Camara scouted her at aclub tournament in Florida, Collings became a Dragon.
“She was really fundamentally sound,” Camara says. “A powerful kid, strong, athletic, and had all the fundamentals down. Paige has been a leader since she’s gotten here. She has that kind of personality. She’s one of our captains this year, and she’s definitely someone who steps up into that leadership role for us on and off the field.”
Collings has improved steadily throughout her career. A First Team All-CAA catcher for all three of her seasons, last year she set Drexel’s single-season home run mark with nine, breaking her own record. A biological sciences major (just like both of her sisters), Collings was also named to the Philadelphia Inquirer’s Academic All-Area Softball Team. To be eligible, a student-athlete must earn a cumulative grade-point average of 3.20 or higher.
Collings’ softball IQ is sky high on the diamond, too; as catcher, she is entrusted with the task of calling the game for her pitchers.
“I like being able to call the pitches,” she says. “You see the whole game in front of you as it unfolds. It’s kind of a natural leadership role and I really like that. Your teammates are always looking to you. I like having so much control.”
Last summer she took her game to a new level, playing her way onto the Canadian national team. Though she didn’t participate in the Pan Am Games, she played in two tournaments, including one near and dear to her heart—at home in British Columbia.
“It was amazing, especially because one of the tournaments was at a softball park in B.C. about half an hour away from my house where I played a lot of my youth ball,” she says of the experience.
Collings has one season left to help her team qualify for the Colonial Athletic Association tournament for the first time in her career. As a co-captain, she’s determined to make that happen.
To an incoming freshman, four years can seem like a lifetime. To a senior withjust one season left, it can feel as though an entire career slipped by in the blink of an eye. As her college career concludes, Collings is unsure whether she’ll rejoin to the Canadian national team, pursue coaching, get a job working in an environmental field, or return home to Canada.
But no matter what she decides, she’ll have left an indelible mark on Drexel softball.
And possibly on the windshield or hood of a car. – Mike Unger
Photo by Tommy Leonardi