Focusing on mental game helps Southwest get over hump - mySanAntonio.com

UIL state tournament

Where: McCombs Field, Austin

Tickets: $5 student, $10 adult; $85 all-tournament pass

Game video: FoxSportsSouthwest.com

Class 5A

Today's semifinals:

Lubbock Coronado (36-4) vs. Deer Park (37-6), 3 p.m.

The Woodlands (38-3) vs. Southwest (34-11), 6 p.m.

Saturday's final: 4 p.m.

SAN ANTONIO — Southwest coach Sandra Hernandez remembers the doubts and questions. It was hard not to, because she had them herself.

Why were the Dragons' promising seasons continually ending earlier than expected? It was a question she was at a loss to figure out.

“I just started to think, 'What am I doing wrong that it's not getting this team over the hump?'” Hernandez said.

With Southwest (34-11) playing The Woodlands at 6 p.m. Friday in the Class 5A state semifinals at McCombs Field in Austin, Hernandez no longer is burdened by such thoughts.

Instead, the Dragons' first trip to the UIL state tournament allows her to reflect fondly on the program's strides.

“Different things happened every year and they kept learning, and I think they finally put their foot down and said it's not going to happen that way anymore,” Hernandez said.

The impetus to the change in result was a change in mindset.

After losing in the regional semifinals to San Benito in 2011, Hernandez started reading books and attending clinics to find an edge to get her team over the top.

“What are you doing?” Southwest senior outfielder Elizabeth Phillips said of her first response to her coach's new ploy. “We're over here warming up before a playoff game, and you're in here reading a book. Some of the things she said are really important.”

Yet the emphasis on mental training didn't catch on initially. In 2012, Brandeis upset the Dragons in the first round and New Braunfels Canyon eliminated them in the second in 2013.

“It's very frustrating, but it gives us something to work for and to work to,” Southwest senior Gabby Flores said of the early playoff exits. “It was kind of, 'Why not us? Why everybody else but us?' We wanted to kind of be the first to do it. I guess that's what drives us.”

Southwest hopes that motivation serves it well when it takes on The Woodlands, ranked No. 9 in the latest USA Today/National Fastpitch Coaches Association Top 25 poll.

The Highlanders — paced by Division I prospects Abby Langkamp (Baylor, 25-0 pitching record), Caitlin Bartsch (Nebraska) and Aubrey Leach (Tennessee) — are making their second trip to state and first since 2011, when they defeated O'Connor 7-5 in the championship game.

“The Woodlands may be favored this weekend, but I don't think they've played a team with this much fight,” Hernandez said. “This group, they don't get scared. They peaked at the most perfect time. They realized they could beat anybody and they've just gone with it.”

tthomas@express-news.net

Twitter: @mysahighschools

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