Jamie Kelling wasn’t surprised by freshman Stephanie Watt’s stellar performance this weekend. The .583 average and three home runs that Watts amassed over her first weekend in orange at no point shocked the senior shortstop.

After all, Kelling is Watts’ ‘Big Sister.’

‘She’s my little sister,’ Kelling said. ‘We have like a big sister, little sister thing on the team, so we spend a lot of time together. Coach set it up before the freshmen even came.’

Thanks to the ‘sisterhood,’ Watts and Kelling room with each other, ride the bus together and even sometimes go out to dinner – just the two of them.

The pairing has given Kelling the opportunity to learn about the standout freshman, and the senior feels that Watts is as mature a freshman one can find as there is.

‘Stephanie plays with a lot of confidence and determination,’ Kelling said. ‘You can feel her confidence when she is on the field.’

Watts exudes that same confidence off the field, and is not afraid to speak about it, as she feels that she should only expect the most out of herself. She excelled this past weekend for Syracuse as the Orange went 2-1 in its season-opening trip to New Mexico.

‘I knew what coach (Leigh) Ross and the rest of the coaching staff expected from me, and that’s what I did this weekend,’ Watts said. ‘I always expect the best out of myself, high numbers and I don’t really think about it while I’m doing it.’

In her first collegiate games this weekend, the freshman from Clovis, Calif., wasted no time exuding what Kelling and Syracuse head coach Ross feel is a unique type of maturity and determination for a freshman.

‘She is such a confident and focused player out there on the diamond,’ Ross said. ‘As a matter of fact, I had the opportunity this weekend to pull her aside during a couple of at-bats, but I just decided to let her be, and it ultimately worked out for us.’

The at-bat Ross harped on the most from this past weekend didn’t result in one of the home runs. Rather it merely resulted in a base-on-balls. With runners in scoring position and facing a 3-1 count at the plate, Watts drew a walk. Ross said the walk to first was a sign of maturity.

The confidence and high level of maturity that Ross and the rest of the coaching staff praise first caught their eye indirectly.

In July of 2007, Ross journeyed out to Boulder, Colo., for the Louisville Slugger Independent Tournament. Eighty of the country’s premier teams were showcasing their talent in the annual classic. At the time, Ross knew nothing of Watts, as she was there to watch one of Watts’ teammates.

‘We found her in Boulder, Colo., and it was just a chance that her team came through,’ Ross said. ‘We were actually originally scouting the catcher on her team, but in warm-ups she caught our eye.’

A year and a half later, Watts took the field for the first time with the coach who trudged all the way out to Colorado and noticed her. This weekend, Watts and the rest of the freshman class almost seemed to breathe some fresh air into a team that struggled so mightily in non-conference play last year.

‘The freshman class has brought a great energy to this team, and the upperclassmen have welcomed them with open arms,’ Ross said. ‘I didn’t expect the freshmen to break out that much, but freshman mentality is great, I love it, and Stephanie definitely embodies that mentality.’

For Ross, with regards to Watts as the season moves along, the third-year head coach is resorting to an old sports cliché.

‘If it isn’t broken, don’t try to fix it,’ Ross said.

aolivero@syr.edu

Published on February 11, 2009 at 12:00 pm