Not only is Amanda Lorenz rated as the No. 1 player in the 2015 class, she can now add another impressive accomplishment to her resume: National Champion.

The talented outfielder, who batted lead-off for the OC Batbusters-Haning team that won the PGF 18U Premier Nationals on Saturday, hit .478 for the week in bracket play and had at least one hit in all seven games (with two hits in four of the seven).

In the championship game, a 3-0 win over the Corona Angels, Amanda went 2-for-3 with a key RBI double.

In today’s blog she looks back on the evolution of her club team and how everyone came together to peak at just the right time.

The incoming senior from Moorpark (Calif.) High also earned 1^st Team All-American honors this spring when she hit .642 this year with eight home runs and 22 doubles.

In 2013, the Florida commit won several national, state and local honors at the high school level including MaxPreps Underclass All-American, CalHiSports.com All-State and Ventura County Star Player of the Year after batting .626 with 17 home runs and compiling a spectacular 1.377 slugging percentage.

Last year, Amanda helped lead Team Mizuno-Stith to the PGF 18U National Championship game and in 2012 she was part of the 16U team that won the PGF national title.

Finally, her prolific hitting stroke has some saying she’s one of the best hitters to ever come out of Southern California.

Click here to read Amanda’s earlier blogs and those from our other outstanding bloggers!

Also, check out the video of Amanda after she learns of being named No. 1 in the 2015 class

 

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This summer has been a battle!

We started working for this championship last August. Toward the end of the month, our new team got together and we started practicing. Our coaches made it very clear to us we would not be finishing second again.

Practices were the hardest they’ve ever been in my five years of being on this team. We always have done EM (Speed and Power Training) before every Saturday practice but what was different this year is we also conditioned once we got to practice.

We ran foul poles, suicides, and bases… all with the thought of second place on our minds.

I’ll admit we hit some rough patches this summer. We didn’t perform at our highest level throughout the beginning of the summer and through New Jersey and Colorado.

But our goal was never to win the Boulder tournament. Would we have loved to win? Absolutely. But I think we needed that loss to the Corona Angels there (5-4 in the semi-finals) to make us a work a little harder.

Our team was not happy after the loss in Boulder. Coach Mike Stith had added up all of our strike-out lookings from the summer and made them foul poles. The practice before PGF Nationals, we ran 25 foul poles (there and back counts as one) as a team.

Once Premier started, everything started to click.

Suddenly, everything fell into place and we were playing how we should’ve been playing all summer. Our pitching was superb and we were stringing hits together at the right time.

I believe getting to play the Beverly Bandits in the first round of bracket was great because we got to see one of the best teams in the tournament right away. We elevated our play because we were playing a good team and, because of that, our play was elevated for the rest of the week.

Our team was on fire the entire time at PGF and we didn’t skip a beat. We were more than prepared going into Saturday’s championship game.

Our team was extremely excited and nervous and we just couldn’t wait to get the game started so our nerves would go away!

Our pitcher, Taylor McQuillin, was lights out, our hitting came around late in the game and I couldn’t be more proud to be apart of this very special team!

My teammates are incredibly talented and this year will be one for the books. It still hasn’t quite sunken in yet that we won. Maybe it will when we order our National Championship ring. Or maybe it won’t!

It’s truly such a surreal feeling and I’m so happy I had the opportunity to be with these girls and win the title this year.

WE ARE THE 2014 PGF NATIONAL CHAMPIONS!

Til fall season starts,

Amanda