After year on bench, Hempfield grad Emma Hoffner making mark for Ohio U softball team

Throughout her time as a softball player, Emma Hoffner grew accustomed to watching games from behind the plate. An accomplished catcher at Hempfield and in travel ball, Hoffner had the best spot to not only watch the action but to exercise a degree of control over it: calling pitches, making sure her teammates were in the right spots, keeping the pitchers calm and focused.

During her freshman season with the Ohio University softball team, Hoffner got a different view of the game: from the bench.

The Bobcats already had an accomplished backstop in fifth-year Brooke Rice, a second-team all-Mid American Conference selection. So Hoffner mostly watched — she appeared in only six games and went hitless in eight at-bats — and learned.

“The team was very successful in what they were doing, and the catcher was a great catcher,” Hoffner, now a sophomore, said. “I’m not going to take anything away from her. She had that spot and deserved that spot.

“She was such a great leader for the team, always being in command on the field. Whenever stuff started to go wrong, everyone looked at her, and she was able to calm people down on the field.”

Now, it’s Hoffner’s turn to be that player. She won the starting catching job in the offseason and has looked like a seasoned veteran. Through the Bobcats’ April 26 split with Toledo, Hoffner was third on the team with a .336 batting average with 11 extra-base hits, including her first collegiate home run, and 25 RBIs.

GOODBYE KALAMAZOO!

EMMA HOFFNER HOME RUN!#OUohyeah pic.twitter.com/tz8dMKOqwz

— Ohio Softball (@OhioBobcatSB) April 29, 2023

Behind the plate, she has a .967 fielding percentage, which compares favorably to Rice’s final season (.968).

First-year coach Jenna Hall has been impressed not only with Hoffner’s performance but her desire to perform. Some of that, she said, was a product of having an unfamiliar spot on the bench last season.

“When I got the job in the fall, she was just like, ‘I want to play,’ ” Hall said. “So from the get-go, Emma … I could feel her passion and the drive that she had. She just works super hard, and she asks really good questions. She’s extremely coachable.”

Of course, Hall wasn’t the coach who recruited Hoffner, but the two had some familiarity with each other.

Before taking the job at Ohio U, Hall had spent the previous three seasons as an assistant at Pitt, so she had crossed paths with Hoffner’s travel team, Ohio Outlaws-Hoffner, coached by Emma’s father, Jim.

“When she was hired, it wasn’t like, ‘Who is this person?’ ” Hoffner said. “There is a little bit of scare, but that’s with any program with new coaches coming in. But they’ve exceeded our expectations.”

The same could be said for the Bobcats and their position in the MAC. Picked to finish third, Ohio U was tied for second (16-7) as of April 26, one game behind Central Michigan.

A big part of the Bobcats’ success has been their pitching. Their team ERA of 3.10 was behind only Central Michigan in the conference, and they were guilty of a league-low 15 wild pitches.

As least some of that success can be attributed to Hoffner. Hall said Hoffner is great at framing pitches and adept at blocking balls in the dirt. Perhaps more importantly, Hall said, Hoffner has developed a strong connection with each of the Bobcats’ four pitchers.

“I think her rapport and her ability to know them individually and knowing how to talk to them and what they need when they’re on the mound is really high level,” Hall said. “They all really enjoy throwing to her and want her behind the plate when they’re pitching.”

Said Hoffner: “Most of my life, I have been working with one or two pitchers on a staff. I haven’t had the amount of pitchers (we have) here. But working with so many pitchers and having so many different relationships is really cool. … I think they’ve definitely built me up.

“I think (taking control on the field) kind of comes naturally to me. It’s nothing I’ve ever been scared of doing. When stuff starts to go wrong on the field, I like being the one people look to. … I love being able to calm people down and know I have their back all the time.”

Hall and Hoffner agree that the one area of her defense that needs to be improved is her ability to throw out runners. Of 77 would-be base stealers, she has thrown out six, one of them in a 1-0 upset of Ohio State. Contrast that to last season when only 17 players even attempted to run on Rice (she threw out 10 of them).

Hall said she can see improvement in Hoffner’s defense and is confident that trend will continue. Offensively, there has been little to worry about.

At one point this season, Hoffner put together a nine-game hitting streak during which, coincidentally or not, Ohio U went 8-1. She had three-RBI games in two of those wins.

But that was followed by a three-game hitless streak, so Hoffner said she is focusing on being more consistent at the plate.

“I said it in an interview a couple weeks ago: Hitting is so streaky,” she said. “I had a couple days when I was doing well, had a couple of days when I wasn’t doing well. So I think it’s about staying more consistent and always trying to push those runs across.”

After spending a year on the bench, Hoffner is just getting started with what she might be able to accomplish at the college level. With two more years to hone her game, there’s no telling what accolades and accomplishments are on the horizon.

“Everybody works hard, but it’s more about how intentional she is about her work and how much it means to her,” Hall said. “I really don’t know what her roof is. … By the time she gets out of here, she’s going to be pretty darn good.”