Runions Awarded Gamer of the Week Honors
Teays Physical Therapy Center, Inc. and The Putnam Herald are pleased to present this week’s Female Gamer of the Week to Senior, Lindzie Runions of the Poca High School softball team.
Lady Poca Dots shortstop Lindzie Runions is having a great start to the 2024 softball season. The Senior recently broke the Dots All Time school record for career Homeruns earlier this season. “Lindzie has worked hard developing her talent level and leadership skills, which has helped Poca Softball achieve our teams’ goals” Head Coach David Skeens. Runions currently has a batting average of .565, 2 home runs, and 7 stolen bases.
Runions first got involved with the sport of softball in 2nd grade after begging her parents to put her in the sport because her friends were playing, so they signed her up for coach pitch. “After a few years they decided I was ready to start playing travel ball, so I tried out and made a 12u team. It wasn’t until around 14u-15u my parents realized I had some potential with softball, so I started attending college camps and got a lot of feedback. I moved around a few travel teams for a couple years until my family and I decided it was in my best interest to move myself on to an out of state travel team to get noticed and have an opportunity to continue playing the game I loved. My parents have always been my biggest supporters and put my softball career at the top of their priority list, from driving me 3 hours to travel practice once a week, 45 minutes to speed and strength training twice a week, an hour to hitting once a week and on top of that my Dad dropping everything in order to take me to hit any time I asked. A big thank you to my mom for always being my biggest cheerleader when nobody else was on my side and having ALL the essentials at travel tournaments”.
Runions loves the competitive aspect of the game and the fact that any team can win on any given day “it drives me to be better every day”. Lindzie’s team goal for this season is “to have a better season than last year, show our true potential and make a good showing in sectionals”. She believes her team has been successful thus far this season because of seniority. “We are a very senior heavy team with 6 seniors, and all 6 are starters. We’ve all been playing together for years and are finally putting our potential out there for show”. When it comes to softball the role model that Runions has is Elicia D’Orazio. “She is a member of the Puerto Rican National team and played at Marshall. Although she moved back home to Florida, working with her and playing under her as my coach were some of the best seasons I’ve had. I still try to keep in touch with her during travel season some and I am forever grateful for the support and encouragement she has shown me”.
Off the softball field Runions is a member of the National Honor Society, Mu Alpha Theta, Rho Kappa, Student Council, and Prom Committee. Runions has also been named to the All-State and All-Conference team for the last 2 years for softball and All-Conference in soccer. Lindzie is also a member of the cheerleading team who became the first team to compete at Nationals in Orlando Florida. She is a member of the Cincy Doom organization for travel ball for which she plays on the Cincy Doom Nationals 18u team. In her free time Lindzie volunteers as a part time little league coach for North Putnam Little League.
Preceding high school, Runions plans to continue her academic and softball career at the University of Rio Grande. During her time at Rio she will pursue a degree in nursing and intends on becoming a travel nurse. “I cannot thank Coach Hammond at Rio enough for believing in me, making me feel at home here, and giving me this opportunity”. The Dots next at home competition will be on April 11th versus the Nitro Wildcats at 6pm.
Please look for other local high school athletes to be named in next week’s female Gamer of the Week Sponsored by Teays Physical Therapy Center, Inc., and The Putnam Herald.
MEGAN SCARBERRY, MS, POTENTIAL PLUS INSTRUCTOR AT TEAYS PHYSICAL THERAPY CENTER INC.