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Former Trumbull County softball stars thriving at Slippery Rock

As the stars of their teams in high school, three Trumbull County softball standouts — Lauren Hawley from Brookfield, McKenzie Garland from Mineral Ridge and Brooke Dawson from Maplewood — have found success at the next level.

And they have found that success as teammates.

Now as seniors at Slippery Rock University of Pennsylvania, those three girls are thriving on a team that currently sits at 23-18 overall and 10-8 in the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference.

Dawson, a pitcher from Maplewood, has accomplished quite a lot at Slippery Rock. Overall, she has a 32-33 record with a 2.83 ERA in 83 appearances in her career. She has struck out 315 batters over 418.1 innings pitched. She was named first team All-Ohio, second team All-Ohio and two-time second team All-NAC.

“Adjusting to college was tough for all of us I’d imagine. We’ve always remained close as a team with each other. I think knowing each other some really helped,” Dawson said.

At Slippery Rock, it wasn’t always an easy time between the three Trumbull County players. At one time, they didn’t like each very much. For good reason that is.

“Brooke and I played travel ball together since we were like 8 years old,” Garland said. “We knew of Lauren when we were in high school. Brooke played in the All-Star game with her and I didn’t like Lauren very much because we always had to play them so much.

“We didn’t know each other very much when we all got here.”

This season for The Rock, Garland is batting .269 with 25 hits and seven RBI as a utility player while starting in all 31 games this year. She did start as a catcher during the 2016 season. She was a four-time letter winner in softball at Mineral Ridge.

Despite playing in different conferences (Maplewood in the Northeastern Athletic Conference, Mineral Ridge in the Inter-Tri County League and Brookfield in the All-American Conference), the three had a fair amount of exposure to each other.

“Lauren said she didn’t like me when we played each other,” Dawson said. “I get that because we all played on good teams and always played each other at least once a year.”

Hawley was a two time All-District softball catcher, four time All-District softball player and played in the Mahoning-Trumbull All Star game at Brookfield. Currently, she is batting .327 with 36 hits and 13 RBI.

“I never even thought about choosing Slippery Rock. When I visited here, I knew that this was the place for me,” Hawley said. “Coach showed me things that I didn’t know that I would need in my college experience.”

For coach Sydney Rice, she knew exactly what she was getting when she recruited all three of the Trumbull girls.

“In respect to Kenz and Brooke as the battery, it is beneficial between pitcher and catcher to have some sort of chemistry like they had when they got here,” Rice said. “I know when I recruit that they won’t be the same athlete and the same person as they are when they are freshmen.”

Rice said that she only worries about getting players who are going to work well with her and with each other. That’s exactly what Rice got when she got Hawley, Dawson and Garland to attend and play at Slippery Rock.

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