Being the catcher for a top-ranked Saints softball team is hard work. Ask team captain Jill Quesenberry.

“She’s pretty much the core of the team, she’s a hard worker, she brings intensity, and is one of the best catchers in the whole NWAACC,” said head coach Meadow McWhorter.
Quesenberry slightly differs with her coach. “I don’t consider myself to be the best. Being a catcher is hard. I work hard at it every day and when I see another catcher I get competitively better. I love the sport and try to accomplish something new every day,” said Quesenberry.

She has an over .400 batting average for the past two years and last year she made first team All-League.

Quesenberry has been swinging the bat since she was about 5, playing whiffle ball, and around the age of 12 she caught softball fever when her Little League team made it all the way to regionals and was one game away from playing in the World Series.

“I like pressure situations, both on offense and defense. On offense there is that personal pressure to perform, and for defense situations everyone has to work together,” she said.
She went to Pendleton High School where, along with softball, she played volleyball, which was big for her, but eventually chose to pursue softball. “I figured I had a better chance (playing softball), because I’m so short (5’3),” said Quesenberry.

Quesenberry is very superstitious when it comes to preparing for a game. She has to listen to one of her favorite CDs, either Sublime or Bob Marley, then she wears the same hair tie, pair of socks (washed every time), she’ll never untie her shoestrings, she wipes away the dirt before she starts the next inning to sort of wipe away the “bad” from the other team’s catcher, and “sometimes when things aren’t going my way I’ll change my hair color,” she said with a grin.

She likes to spend her free time with her boyfriend, going to the Saturday Market. She also likes to go hang out with some of her teammates. “The team is very close both on and off the field,” she said.

Ivan “Pudge” Rodriguez is someone who has been a huge sports influence on her. He’s a catcher for the Detroit Tigers and is best known for his arm. “He’s not arrogant, he’s a team player and he’s a teacher. That’s something that I try to do as well. I hope to lend some of my knowledge to my teammates,” said Quesenberry.

Her role models are her mom, aunts and grandmother because “they have been very successful in life, raising an awesome family.”

Next year she will be off to University of Oregon, but only as a student. “I kind of just want to be free from being scheduled around softball. I’ll still play on the side, and I’ll never lose my love for the game.”

Quesenberry is majoring in romantic languages and has hopes of becoming a Spanish teacher for either high school or college students, and she’s also considering becoming an interpreter. Sometime while she’s at the U of O, she will go on a foreign exchange trip to Spain.

Later on in life, softball might find its way back into her agenda.

“I think I might become a coach someday. That’s something that I’d really like to do, maybe coach Little League. I’d like to work with the little kids teaching them the game,” said Quesenberry.