It has been a big week for Perry pitcher Emma Olejniczak. On Tuesday, she was honored for crossing over the 750 career strikeout milestone and now Raccoon Valley Radio has learned that she will continue her pitching career at the Division One level. Olejniczak has verbally committed to the University of Northern Iowa beginning in the fall of 2017. There were a lot of schools who showed interest in the power pitcher from Perry.
“I took a lot of visits this winter along with going to a number of camps,” stated the future Panther. It pretty much started from scratch. I filled out the recruitment forms, I emailed coaches and told them to come to my fall games on the club team that I played on. Once I was done with the camps or they emailed me back, I continued to put myself out there and told them I would love to have them watch games this spring and summer. Eventually, I narrowed it down to 3 and 4 schools and chose UNI.”
Olejniczak has built a reputation as a strikeout pitcher as evident by her 223 strikeouts this year and 261 K’s a season ago. She felt Northern Iowa provided the right fit.
“I really liked their program. I know some of the girls that play on the team, I like the distance from home, I like the campus plus I have family that live in the area so it was a pretty easy decision when you add all of that up.”
Olejniczak knows she has a lot of work to do before she exchanges the Perry Blue for the UNI purple and gold.
“I need to continue to strikeout people and really work on my hitting. I worked a lot in the offseason but not nearly as much on the hitting front as I did with my pitching. That will be a key area of focus for me this offseason as I want to be a major contributor for our team next summer at the plate.”
It hasn’t always been easy for Olejniczak and the Perry Jayettes trying to rebuild a program in what many experts consider the most difficult conference in the state in all 5 classes. Perry has improved from the 12 win team back in her 8th grade year to a confident team that is enjoying its best season to date since the school’s last state tournament appearance nearly 2 decades ago. Olejniczak feels the program is close to breaking into the state tournament field and she is determined to do her part to make sure that happens.
“I think I have 2 secret weapons. I am an east-west pitcher and not so much north and south, so I like to come in on the hands with the screw ball and then get them chasing the curveball. The movement will always be the key for me. Coach Kenney and I have come up with that for our game plan and its fun to see it paying off.”
Perry will open up regional competition on Thursday, July 7th at home against Greene County.