Neuqua Valley's Krista Waldusky ‘isn't the quietest one out of the bunch.' They wouldn't have it any other way.
Krista Waldusky learned years ago that she wasn't born to pitch.
But the Neuqua Valley senior can look back at that discovery and smile.
'I started off, and I just wasn't that good at pitching,' Waldusky said. 'I walked three girls, and I was like, 'Oh god, I cannot do this. I'm done. I quit.' I just didn't have the mentality for it.'
For Waldusky, catching is a much different story. She said she moved behind the plate as an 8-year-old, and she enrolled in catching lessons a year later.
'My dad had played baseball, and he was a catcher,' Waldusky said. 'He was like, 'I know it seems boring, but trust me, you're gonna love it,' and then it just kind of took off from there.
'It's not like the most flashy position, but you're involved in every play. You're the captain of the field. You have a different viewpoint that nobody else has, and I think that's something that's really valuable.'
Waldusky has proved to be invaluable for Neuqua Valley (3-5, 1-0), which won its DuPage Valley Conference opener against Naperville Central on Thursday. Offensively, she was hitting .391 with seven RBIs through eight games after batting .308 with 23 RBIs last season. But she showed signs of being a leader early in her three-year varsity career.
'We all knew right away,' Neuqua Valley coach Danielle Asquini said. 'Krista isn't the quietest one out of the bunch. She's very enthusiastic and energetic.
'The position that she plays requires her to be vocal and, for lack of a better word, bossing around her defense. But she does that with such ease. No one feels it as an order. It's more of a helpful and supportive way for her to lead our team.'
Waldusky will use a soft touch if that's needed.
'She's been my rock through it all,' Neuqua Valley senior pitcher Ava Drehs said. 'If I pitch a mispitch, she'll be like, 'Hey, it's OK, you got it.' And if I pitch a great pitch, she'll be like, 'Great pitch, Ava.'
'She's very vocal and reassuring, which is helpful to know someone is going through it with me.'
Outside the chalk, Waldusky can walk the tightrope too. She's a standout student, and her playful side shines through at events like the team's Meet the Wildcats night, when Waldusky commanded the spotlight by doing the worm — executed beautifully, according to her.
Waldusky, the youngest of four children, comes from an athletic family and said she has received unending support from her parents, Tim and Michelle. Her older sister is a former cheerleader, and her two older brothers swam and played ice hockey, respectively, at Neuqua Valley and in college. Their success actually steered Waldusky away from those sports.
'I played every sport imaginable,' she said. 'I tried swimming, dance, hockey, volleyball, soccer, everything. But I wanted something that was different from my siblings. So I didn't want to swim, I didn't want to play hockey and I didn't want to be a cheerleader. Those were the three things off my list immediately.'
Waldusky did learn some things from her brothers, though.
'Watching both of my brothers sacrifice so much to achieve their dreams put in that expectation for me,' she said. 'If I wanted to play college softball, then I had to sacrifice a lot. They were skipping out on parties, football games and stuff like that. But it all wound up working out.
'So I know that when I'm sacrificing those things, it will eventually pay off.'
Playing in college will fulfill a longtime dream for Waldusky.
'I knew I wanted to play softball and take it very seriously,' she said. 'For the past four years, it's been that constant grind of wake up, go to school, go to practice, come home, work out, sleep. All of that is paying off.'
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Chicago Tribune
21 hours ago
- Chicago Tribune
‘There's really no stopping' Creighton commit Ava Drehs, the 2025 Naperville Sun Softball Player of the Year
Ava Drehs had recently moved from Aurora to Naperville when she and her father, Wayne, started exploring their new environs. She was about to begin first grade when she first saw Neuqua Valley. 'I had just started softball, so I wanted to see the schools,' Drehs said. 'Me and my dad drove past the Neuqua fields, and it was like, 'Oh, look at the awesome softball field.' 'I thought, 'Wow, if I could play softball for Neuqua, that would be amazing. It would be so cool if I could even make the varsity team one day.'' Drehs not only made the varsity team. She made history. 'She's amazing,' Neuqua Valley coach Danielle Asquini said. 'She's just gotten better every school year, and you can see that in her stats and the success that she's had. 'It's been amazing to watch her, and we're definitely going to miss it.' Drehs, the 2025 Naperville Sun Softball Player of the Year, was better than ever this season. The senior pitcher went 16-6 with a 1.54 earned-run average and a 0.87 WHIP for the DuPage Valley Conference champion Wildcats (17-15, 12-3). In 154 1/3 innings, Drehs struck out 278 and walked just 27. The Creighton recruit broke her single-season program record for strikeouts and also set the career strikeout mark with 670. Those records had been held by Hannah Meeks, who was the player of the year in 2021 and 2022 and pitches at Illinois State. 'She was super talented, and when she was a senior, I was a freshman, so I always looked up to her,' Drehs said. 'So to be able to know that I competed with the records that she held means a lot.' Drehs, the DuPage Valley Conference pitcher of the year and an all-state second-team pick, competed hard every time she played, never easing up. 'Ava is always ready to go and up for a challenge,' Asquini said. 'Even in relief, she's warmed up and ready. We can exchange a glance and know that her time might be coming. 'She is so excited, so hyped up every single time she's stepping in the circle.' Drehs didn't only overpower hitters. She also outsmarted them. 'Something that's really special about Ava is that she's constantly adjusting,' Neuqua Valley senior catcher Krista Waldusky said. 'So if she sees they're gonna chase that outside pitch, then she's like, 'I'm gonna push them further and further and further off the plate. I'm not gonna give them a good pitch to swing at because I know that they're gonna chase it.' 'If the first rise ball doesn't really break as much as she'd like it to, the next one will. She is constantly making those adjustments to make herself the hardest pitcher to hit.' Drehs did it with pinpoint control. She never walked more than two batters in any outing, so if she got ahead in the count, hitters always seemed to chase. Drehs is always chasing greatness by thinking ahead. 'This year, one big example of that is in our regional semifinal game against Oswego East,' she said. 'We won, but I wasn't really proud of the way I pitched. I feel like they were making a lot of contact, and I wasn't too happy about it 'So before our next game, I talked to coach, and we figured out some adjustments. When I brought that to Krista, I said, 'Look, I think we should try this.'' Drehs broke out a two-seam fastball and pitched a six-hitter with no earned runs in the Wildcats' 6-0 loss to Oswego, which won the state title on June 14. 'I had seven strikeouts, and five of them were on that new pitch,' Drehs said. 'So we're constantly adjusting what we're doing. It's never the same.' Indeed, Drehs is never standing still. She knows she will have to improve at Creighton, and Asquini doesn't doubt she will. 'As she gets older, I think she's going to get stronger,' Asquini said. 'That's what she wants, and when someone is as motivated as she is, there's really no stopping her at that point.' Drehs will major in elementary education and wants to return to Naperville as a first grade teacher. It would be a full-circle moment for someone who may already have inspired someone who could try to break her records. Drehs' sister Zoe, who will begin sixth grade in the fall, plays softball and soccer. 'I'm so excited,' Drehs said. 'I've always wanted to be a teacher. I have a little sister who is seven years younger than me, and I used to prop her up on chairs and teach her like we were in school.'
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3 days ago
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28-05-2025
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Neuqua Valley freshman Asha Kikama ensures ‘no one's going to get past her.' Not even Naperville Central.
Neuqua Valley's Asha Kikama was given a difficult assignment on Tuesday. The freshman defender had to mark Naperville Central star senior forward Callie Tumilty and had to move slightly out of position to do it. 'There's always nerves, but you gotta remember she's just a girl,' Kikama said. 'She goes to school like everyone else. So I have to bring the same intensity to her, keep her in front of me. 'As long as she doesn't shoot it, she's not going to score.' The Ohio State-bound Tumilty didn't score, mustering only two off-target shots, and neither did Naperville Central, which was shut out for the only time this season. The efforts by Kikama and other defenders like senior Chloe Orlow, plus a great goal by junior forward Alexis May, allowed the third-seeded Wildcats to upset the second-seeded Redhawks 1-0 in the Class 3A Naperville North Sectional semifinals. Neuqua Valley (16-3), which is in the sectional championship game for the first time since 2018, will play fourth-seeded Naperville North (14-5-3) at 5 p.m. Friday. 'I want to work as hard as I can for my whole team,' Kikama said. 'I have a good feeling, given that I gave everything I could have out there for my team and left everything on the field.' It's been that way all season for Kikama, who plays center back alongside Orlow. On Tuesday, though, Neuqua Valley coach Arnoldo Gonzalez had Kikama play defensive midfielder, slightly in front of Orlow. 'It was almost going back to my days and that stopper-sweeper position,' Gonzalez said. 'We just wanted that extra body in the middle playing a little bit high up. But if she needs that help, she can still tuck in.' The Redhawks (20-2-1), who had won 14 straight games since losing 2-1 to the Wildcats on April 8, nearly tucked away a goal 10 minutes after kickoff when senior midfielder Rebecca Ruggiero's header hit the crossbar. But they had few chances after that as Neuqua Valley defended vigorously all over the field, starting up top with Yale-bound senior forward Selma Larbi. 'Defensively, our plan was to just be extremely aggressive, to just go to every ball,' Larbi said. 'Then offensively, I knew I might have been outnumbered, so I just had to continue to run at them and try to force like a bad ball or like a bad kick.' The tactic disrupted Naperville Central's rhythm, and the Wildcats' confidence soared when May received a pass from freshman midfielder Caitlin King and ripped a 20-yard shot inside the right post with 37:32 left in the second half. Kikama and her teammates then held off every rush by the Redhawks. 'She was playing out of position tonight,' Orlow said. 'She stepped into the midfield, and she showed that she could play anywhere on the field. 'She's going to work her heart out out there so that we can keep the ball. Callie got nothing on her.' Larbi was impressed but not stunned. 'Asha is extremely consistent,' Larbi said. 'She's a very good player. It's not just this game. She's done well in almost every single game that we played this season. She's extremely, extremely aggressive, and it's really, really hard to get past her. 'As you can see tonight, a lot of the central attackers had a really hard time getting past her. She's just a wall, and she has the mindset that no one's going to get past her.' This mindset was even more prevalent down the stretch, when Kikama made two clean slide tackles in her box. That's a tactic rarely used at the high school level due to the risk, and Gonzalez sometimes warns her to be careful. 'But she's very confident,' Gonzalez said. 'She really reads the game well, so she's anticipating for the most part. She is never really getting stuck committing fouls. 'She plays on the edge, keeps you on the edge of the seat. But she's really good at what she does, which is anticipating and recovery.' Soccer talent runs in Kikama's family. Her father, Kividi, played at SIU-Edwardsville. Her brother Ayel, 20, played for Neuqua Valley, and her brother Aton, 16, plays club soccer. But playing great defense also requires confidence. Kikama said that comes from experience and supportive teammates. 'The bench is always cheering on everyone, and especially Chloe was telling me, 'You got it,'' Kikama said. 'Everyone is building you up together. That gives you a lot.'
