All-American Flashback: Kelsi Dunne (2008-11)
1/20/2016 12:00:00 AM | Softball
In honor of Alabama softball's 20th anniversary, rolltide.com will be catching up with our 20 former All-Americans in a series of feature interviews. Our 14th feature is with four-time All-American pitcher Kelsi Dunne (2008-11), who owns Alabama's career strikeout record and pitched in three World Series over her career.
The fertile recruiting grounds of Florida produced the Crimson Tide's fourth four-time All-American, pitcher Kelsi Dunne from Port Orange. Dunne burst onto the national recruiting scene as a junior at Spruce Creek High School. She was the 2006 and 2007 Gatorade Player of the Year in Florida and was the 2007 EA Sports National Player of the Year. The softball accolades came after a long and trying road that saw Dunne question if she was even cut out to play softball.
"I played softball and basketball growing up," Dunne said. "I actually enjoyed basketball a lot more than softball because it was a more physical game and it came a lot more naturally to my abilities. I first got interested in pitching when I was really young but I didn't truly pursue it until I was about 12 years old. My dad, who was the athletic director at Daytona State College, started a travel ball team. He told me before he started the team that I really needed to decide if I wanted to pursue softball or if I was just there to make friends. That's when I decided I wanted to get serious about pitching and softball. When I started taking pitching lessons around 12 years old, a lot of people told me I wasn't good enough and that maybe I should play another sport like tennis, golf or swimming because I wouldn't be able to contribute to the success of a team. That was where I got a lot of my motivation throughout my high school career. I wanted to become a great pitcher and help a team reach its goals.
Living about 100 miles from Gainesville, Dunne grew up a Florida Gator fan, attending softball and football games with her alumni father, Will. Her dream was to study medicine at Florida, but increased national attention provided Dunne with more options, including Alabama.
"I didn't start receiving letters from schools until my freshman year of high school. When I was 14 I blew out my knee and missed my freshman season. That caused a lot of schools to take me off their list because I had to have major reconstructive surgery. That was when my recruitment became a little limited. I really struggled on the field my sophomore season so I really began to rethink my future and if this was a route I was destined to take. My parents always instilled in me to work hard for what you want and don't let anything stop you from achieving your goals. I spent countless hours after my surgery at pitching lessons and my junior year ended up being my best year of my high school career. I had 38 strikeouts in 17 innings in a playoff game that year and a former Alabama player sent [Pat] Murphy the article from that game and that's when Alabama came in the picture. I remember Murphy being at all of my summer games in 2006 before my senior year. I always saw his crimson shirt and hat behind home plate in the stands.
"I honestly knew nothing about Alabama or the tradition they carried because my eyes had always been dead-set on Florida. I met Vann [Studemann] and Murphy in Colorado and they both greeted me with big bear hugs. That was definitely something I wasn't used to but it intrigued me because I'm a huge family girl. I remember Vann had the biggest country twang accent and was really outgoing and I thought it would be great to work with her in the bullpen every day. Once we got home from that tournament, my Dad and I did some research on Alabama and I decided I would take a visit. Neither of my parents wanted me to be narrow-minded about just attending Florida. They wanted me to be open to every possibility in the recruiting process."
Dunne's three official visits all were in the SEC. She started with LSU, continued with Alabama and was set to finish with Florida.
"On my visit at Alabama, I had a great time and it felt like home," Dunne said. "That was the most important part to me. I wanted to find somewhere I felt at home, would receive a great education and be able to compete for championships on the field. The first person on the team I met was Brittany Rogers, who was my host. She made it a great experience. I told my parents while I was there that I wanted to commit right away and not even take my visit to Florida. My parents insisted that I look at all my possibilities though. My visit to Florida was on the last weekend of October right before the signing period so I had to make a decision quick. After the visit, I was torn because Florida was always my dream school and the state is my home, but Alabama really felt like home. I called Murphy to share how I was feeling and it really felt like I was talking to a father figure. He asked what he could do for me and how he could help me make my decision. He wasn't trying to sell Alabama, it was like talking to family. That's when I knew I needed to be at Alabama. He cared about me as a person, not just about what I could contribute to a team. I thought about it for a few days and ended up calling back and committing."
Dunne's arrival in Tuscaloosa heading into the 2008 season came at a very key turning point in the program's history. Following a loss to Washington in the 2007 Super Regional round, the returning players made it a point of emphasis to increase the intensity and focus the following year. The examples set by returning standouts such as Charlotte Morgan and Chrissy Owens made a huge impression on Dunne as a freshman.
"I definitely think we had great leadership with the returning players," Dunne said. "The team didn't talk about the past much, we just focused on our goals for that year. I really struggled with the workouts that year because it was all new to me but everyone was really supportive. I knew I needed to get in shape quickly. It was hard for me my freshman year because I didn't pitch in practice for a whole month because of elbow issues so I just ran poles during BP from March on. I hated running at first but I learned to love it because I was getting in better shape for the team and I felt better pitching in games. I needed to be resilient and not waste my freshman year because I was out there for my teammates and we wanted to achieve the goals we had set. They had been through the heartbreak the year before against Washington and I wanted to help them reach the postseason and get to the World Series because that was the team goal. The process is the fun part of it. Getting out there and working together, facing hardship and getting better together is extremely rewarding.
"I really looked up to Charlotte Morgan even though she was just a sophomore. She was so competitive. She went out and competed in every practice and every game like it was her last. We had a great bond and we ended up being each other's biggest cheerleaders. I loved when she had three-pitch innings because she had so much fun with that. I didn't spend many bullpens with her my freshman year because she had to hit as well, but I relished her knowledge of the game. She even taught me the drop curve in one of our bullpen sessions. I had a lot of respect for her and how hard she worked, especially being injured for most of her career. Charlotte pulled me aside one practice and said, 'we've got to work on your throw to first today. You've got to stop hitting me in the shins!' I was shocked and kind of scared but whenever I was pitching and she was at first base, I swear I always hit her in the shins when I had to make a throw. I don't have a clue why, I never had a problem throwing overhand before, but we stayed after practice that day, worked on it and it never happened again.
"I spent many bullpens with Chrissy Owens since neither of us had to hit. We competed against each other a lot and she shared a lot of stories about her experience pitching in the SEC and at the World Series. She really helped me balance life and softball. I was all about school and softball when I arrived but it was great to have someone let me know that it was OK to let my personality come through and that I could get the job done at the same time. It was still hard for me because I always forced myself to be really serious and put on a poker face while I was pitching."
As strong as the bond between pitchers can be, the one between the pitcher and the catcher is arguably one of the strongest in sports. Ashley Holcombe was the incumbent starting catcher as a junior in 2008 and provided a lively counterpoint to Dunne's stone-cold mentality in the circle.
"I was so inspired by Ashley Holcombe because of the energy she constantly had in games," said Dunne. "Before the season, I was always pitching to a manager in BP because she had to hit, so when I got into games and got to pitch to her it was a treat. It was game day and I got to pitch to Ashley? I loved it! She was so energetic, always communicated and really knew my tendencies and if she needed to come out and talk with me. She was a great teammate. She had the pitchers' backs. We knew that if someone got on base, they were going to get caught stealing or picked off. It helped us pitch because we weren't stressed if we walked someone or if they got a hit. She was so excited every time we made an out or got a strikeout like it was the World Series. I loved it. I was very quiet when I pitched so her fist pump and her cheer after every out really helped me celebrate the little things. She was a great catcher and an even better teammate to compete with."
The transition to life at Alabama was trying at times on and off the field for Dunne as a freshman, but the family atmosphere provided by the team ultimately helped ease her into her new life in Tuscaloosa.
"Mostly, I looked to Murphy and Vann for guidance," Dunne said. "I was 18 years old, nine hours from home and I was such a family girl. The move was hard for me and I was extremely homesick in the fall of my freshman year. I had a lot of talks with Vann about it and she helped ensure that everything would be fine. I looked to the coaches and team for the family atmosphere and there's no doubt they provided that and so much more.
"It was a family environment. That was something that was huge to me when I was deciding where to go to college. The team got together all the time. I spent a lot of time with Amanda Locke and Lauren Parker off the field. One of my favorite memories was Halloween my junior year. I've never been a big Halloween fan but that was the first time I carved a pumpkin. A bunch of us hung out, carved pumpkins, ordered pizza, played music and just had so much fun. The girls were a lot of fun to be around. It's crazy how quickly that time goes by. Looking back, I can't believe my last year was five years ago. It seems like just yesterday."
Outside of softball, the team occasionally had spare time to take in the favorite pastime of a typical Alabama student: Alabama football games.
"My favorite time of year outside of softball season was football season," Dunne said. "Before I came to Alabama, I had no clue who Bear Bryant was but I quickly learned about the tradition of the team and I loved going to the games. I even went to a lot of the away games and enjoyed making memories with my teammates and meeting new friends. Lauren Parker and I had a tradition before the football games my freshman and sophomore years where we would go to this little barbeque place on 15th street and then park at the softball field and walk over to Bryant-Denny. Courtney Conley and I went to the SEC Championship game in Atlanta my junior year with my friends from home because we were playing Florida."
Dunne is one of just three Alabama pitchers to pitch in three different World Series, along with Stephanie VanBrakle and Jaclyn Traina. She was the first freshman at Alabama to win a game at the WCWS, defeating Arizona State in 2008. She would remain the only freshman to do so until Alexis Osorio in 2015.
"The summer before I came to Alabama, I played in a summer ball national tournament in Oklahoma City so I had a little familiarity with the stadium," Dunne said. "Getting there as a freshman though, the stadium felt huge. It felt like there were a million people there cheering you on. When I went again as a sophomore, it was definitely more comfortable because I already had the experience. By the time we went my senior year, it was just a lot of fun. There were no nerves. We felt like we worked hard and deserved to be there. We just enjoyed the process and didn't focus on the outcome."
As a sophomore in 2009, Dunne secured her second trip to the World Series after throwing consecutive no-hitters in the Super Regional round against Jacksonville State, becoming the first player in NCAA history to do so in postseason play.
"It's crazy because I have never been the type of person to pay attention to stats," Dunne said. "I never paid attention to my own or other teams and I honestly never really wanted a scouting report. I just wanted to go out and pitch the best I could and compete with my teammates. It was so much fun to get out there and compete with my team because we knew the next step was the World Series. I really enjoyed the process of competing and winning those two games. There's no way I would be able to accomplish what I did in those games without my coaches and teammates. I remember Whitney Larsen made a phenomenal play out in left-center field that could have easily been a double. Our team played a great defensive weekend and they scored a whole bunch of runs. When Murphy was recruiting me, he pulled out a stat that blew my mind: the Alabama offense scored five runs a game on average. Who wouldn't be comfortable in the circle knowing that? I was excited for that 2009 senior class to end their careers at the World Series."
Dunne threw nine no-hitters over her Alabama career, accounting for over a third of the no-hitters in program history. Her .165 career batting average against is the top mark at Alabama and one of just three under .200, while her career ERA of 1.61 ranks fourth. Her 92 complete games and 113 career wins are both second in the Crimson Tide record books.
Following the two no-hitters against Jacksonville State, Alabama went 2-1 at the 2009 Women's College World Series before ending its season with a 6-5 loss to top-ranked Florida. The Gators and the Tide played many high-stakes games during the regular season and postseason over Dunne's career and the Florida native admits that those matchups always stood out.
"Every series in the SEC is top-notch and very competitive but, obviously, the biggest personal rivalry to me was Florida," Dunne said. "That's where I always thought I was going to be playing softball as a kid. Every series, there's no doubt in my mind that I was overly anxious to pitch against them. They were and still are a great team. It always came down to them or us winning the regular season conference title in my four years."
The Tide and the Gators finished at the top of the Eastern and Western divisions of the SEC in each of Dunne's four years, with Florida taking home a pair of SEC regular season titles in 2008 and 2009 before Alabama won in 2010 and 2011.
Now five years removed from her senior season, Dunne still uses the lessons learned at Alabama in her everyday life.
"I learned a lot at Alabama, but the biggest thing was selflessness," Dunne said. "You need to treat others the way you want to be treated. They called it an 'attitude of gratitude'. Doing the right things on and off the field, leading by example, being coachable and being a great student. One of the first things Murphy told us was that the sooner you learn it's not about you the better off you'll be and that is absolutely true. Alabama softball is all about creating relationships and going above and beyond for others even if they aren't capable of doing anything for you in return. Murphy really stressed the importance of introducing yourself to others properly and being places on time because you never know what difference you may make in someone else's life."
"Some of my favorite memories were signing autographs after games and creating relationships with our fans," Dunne said. "I always promised myself that if I ever had the chance to play at a university and be in the position I was, I would take the extra time to spend with the fans and the young girls who looked up to us and supported us. I had been in their shoes before and it was just the right thing to do. That was really important to me and I still stay in touch to several of our fans to this day."
Dunne is currently back in Florida and is entering her first season as the head softball coach at Embry Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach.
"It's been a great opportunity and challenge to start my own program and build the foundation based on a lot of the things I learned in Tuscaloosa," Dunne said. "Many of the important parts of the team and building it the right way are certainly areas I've utilized with my team. The people here are first class and the support we get is out of this world. It's been a great experience so far and I look forward to building our championship program. I'm enjoying being back home with family as well and being able to spend time with them."
