Clarinda senior Addison Wagoner was presented a plaque for being the program's new career kills record holder Tuesday, Oct. 14, prior to the Cardinals' Senior Night win over Shenandoah.
Clarinda senior Addison Wagoner was presented a plaque for being the program's new career kills record holder Tuesday, Oct. 14, prior to the Cardinals' Senior Night win over Shenandoah.
Janessa Woolsey has been a dependable bat for much of her Clarinda softball career, but her numbers this past summer, her junior year, were by far her best for a single season.
Woolsey is the Southwest Iowa Herald Summer Sports Female Athlete of the Year after a season that saw her break the school record, by a large margin, for RBIs in a season.
Clarinda junior Janessa Woosley rounds second base after one of her two hits Thursday, July 9, during a regional win over Shenandoah.
“It felt really good to do,” Woolsey said. “I have been aiming to break a school record since my freshman year and it’s something I really wanted to do before I graduated. It felt really good.”
Her 52 RBIs broke the previous record of 40. Teammate Annika Price was one of two that held the record previously and Price’s total of 43 this summer would have been best if not for Woolsey’s record-setting season.
“Records are meant to be broken,” Woolsey said. “I was actually hoping maybe Annika would do this year. That would have been great for her to do her senior year, and I still have another year to play but it was really nice.”
Woolsey’s 52 RBIs were nearly as many as the 56 she drove in her sophomore and freshman seasons combined. She finished the year with 49 hits, including eight doubles, five home runs and one triple. Her total of 49 hits were 11 more than her previous season high.
Woolsey and Price were part of an impressive three-athlete middle of the order for the Cardinals this season, along with Rylee Maher.
Clarinda junior Janessa Woolsey leads off second base Friday, June 26, during a win at Shenandoah. Woolsey provided three hits for the Cardinals.
“Rylee got on base quite a bit,” Woolsey said, “and Annika was on a base a lot too. I knew if Annika didn’t hit Rylee in, then I knew I needed to do a job but not try to do too much.”
While there has been a bit of personnel turnover on the Clarinda team over the past few years, Woolsey said they are just like a family.
“We spend a lot of time together and all get along,” Woolsey said, “which is nice.”
Woolsey said her improvement this season came down to simply putting in the work. She has what she says is “like a shop” at home where she hits at least 15 minutes every day, mainly tee-work and focusing on her mechanics. With that work, it puts her in a mindset when during a game, especially in a big spot, she doesn’t have to think much.
Clarinda junior Janessa Woolsey makes a play on a foul ball Thursday, May 28, during a home win over Shenandoah.
“I just go up there and think see ball, hit ball,” Woolsey said. “I have to find my pitch, but I don’t really go up there thinking a lot.”
Woolsey started her softball career playing tee-ball and played quite a bit of tournament ball during her younger years. She admitted her eighth-grade year and stepping up to the varsity level was a struggle and left her in a spot where she wanted to do more.
“I played a little bit in eighth grade and didn’t hit the ball well at all,” Woolsey said. “I went home to my mom, and I was crying and knew I needed to do something about it. So, we went and got a hitting coach in Omaha. I spend a lot of hours in the car, going to lessons every week, and I hit every day outside of softball.”
She has played club softball for multiple teams during her high school career and is looking forward to next season with the Southwest Iowa Legends that will give her a chance to play again with some of the girls she played with when she was younger.
While Woolsey still has another season left for Clarinda, she’s already well into the recruiting process, something that Clarinda head coach Brad Knight has helped her with quite a bit.
“I have been talking to a few college coaches,” Woolsey said, “and am still weighing my option but playing college softball is something I definitely want to do.”
Congratulations to Woolsey as the first Southwest Iowa Herald Summer Sports Female Athlete of the Year.
Next week, the first year-end awards are released with the reveal of the All-Sports All-Area Team. The following week will be the unveiling of the first Southwest Iowa Herald Male and Female Athlete of the Year.
Clarinda softball advances to Round 2, beating Shenandoah
Shenandoah senior Teagan Brunk broke Shenandoah tennis' all-time match wins record Wednesday, April 29, at the Atlantic Tournament. His three doubles wins gave him 99 for his career, passing Andrew Lawrence.
Shenandoah senior Teagan Brunk broke Shenandoah tennis' all-time match wins record Wednesday, April 29, at the Atlantic Tournament. His three doubles wins gave him 99 for his career, passing Andrew Lawrence.
For four years, the Shenandoah baseball team knew that if they needed a strong start on the mound in a big game, Logan Twyman was the person they would call on to pitch. He finished his career this summer with his best season yet.
Twyman is the Southwest Iowa Herald Summer Sports Male Athlete of the Year after a season that saw him strike out 53 batters over 35 innings with a 1.60 ERA.
Those numbers are the best that he’s put up from what has been a fantastic high school career and he hopes that experience carries him forward as he’ll continue his baseball career at Southwestern Community College in Creston.
Twyman said the offseason between his junior and senior seasons was the hardest he has worked, improving his craft on the mound.
Shenandoah senior Logan Twyman delivers a warmup pitch before his second inning of work on the mound Tuesday, June 2, during a home win over Red Oak. Twyman struck out 12 in the complete game win.
“We went to a lot of college camps, and I really started playing long toss and really tried to throw a ball hard,” Twyman said. “I gained a lot of velocity going into my senior year and that helped a lot.”
Twyman’s 53 strikeouts this summer beat his previous season high by nine while his 1.60 ERA was 1.28 better than his previous best.
“I topped out at 79 (miles per hour on the fastball) during my junior year,” Twyman said, “and then I ended up hitting 86 after the season. That’s a huge jump for me and it just shows what my potential is. That was a huge mental block as well, being able to see that I can produce that kind of stuff.”
Just looking at the fastball, Twyman hopes to reach 90 at some point and said being able to continue his baseball career in college means quite a bit to him.
Shenandoah senior Logan Twyman makes a warmup pitch Friday, June 12, during a home win over Clarinda. Twyman struck out nine over 4 1/3 innings.
“Baseball is a sport I love,” Twyman said, “and a sport I grew up playing my whole life. I want to keep playing it for as long as I have the opportunity.”
Twyman said choosing SWCC was a great fit, and being a junior college, means if he can continue to improve and perform at a high level, maybe he can continue at a four-year school after that.
This summer was the fourth season in a row that Twyman led the Mustangs in innings and strikeouts. He starred for a Shenandoah team that looked primed for a big season after a walk-off win over Clarinda June 12, the team’s seventh straight to move to 8-3 on the season.
Twyman said that win over Clarinda was a game that stands out for him in looking back at his senior season.
“That was probably the most nervous I have been,” Twyman said. “Clarinda is a team that we always want to beat, and I came out and pitched pretty good. We ended up winning and we were playing really well.”
From there, though, the Mustangs struggled. After dropping both ends of a doubleheader to Hawkeye 10 champion Lewis Central, the Mustangs beat Creston and Atlantic before a loss to the same Trojan team the following day started a seven-game losing streak. The Mustangs won their last two regular season games but were then upset by Red Oak in a district semifinal, the team’s first postseason game.
Shenandoah senior Logan Twyman looks in from first base Tuesday, June 30, during a home win over Tri-Center.
“It was rough,” Twyman said on the season’s finish. “We took a nosedive toward the end. I don’t know, we just didn’t have it.”
While it may have been a rough finish, it was the end of a stellar career for Twyman, who threw 6 2/3 innings on the mound for the season as an eighth grader and then led the team with 35 innings pitched as a freshman. He threw 35 or more innings each of his last four seasons and struck out at least 41 each of those last four seasons.
“I got a lot of experience when I was younger,” Twyman said. “I started being the ace as a freshman and it was important, just going out and knowing the confidence the coaches put in me that I had to go out and show what I could do.”
Twyman said his mindset of being Shenandoah’s ace pitcher changed quite a bit over the course of his career.
“As a young kid, I knew people depended on me but not as much,” Twyman said, “Toward my junior year, it was more like you have to be good no matter what and you had to come through. It got easier to deal with that pressure as high school went on but in the beginning it was rough.”
Twyman went on to say that he made a start against Harlan during his freshman year where he pitched about four innings and racked up some strikeouts, and he remembered thinking, “I could probably keep doing this for a while.”
Fast forward to his final season at Shenandoah where Twyman made the team’s final start, a tough loss in which he was brilliant for much of the game, striking out 11 and throwing just 84 pitches in a complete game loss.
Twyman was one of six seniors on this season’s Mustangs, all of which were regular starters during the team’s 12-13 season.
“It was a great group of kids,” Twyman said, “and we played really well. This is the best team we have had in a few years and were really talented with three college baseball players. We just didn’t play well in the playoffs.”
Congratulations to Twyman as the first Southwest Iowa Herald Summer Sports Male Athlete of the Year. The Summer Sports Female Athlete of the Year is released Wednesday. Next week, the All-Sports, All-Area Team is revealed, followed by the Male and Female Athlete of the Year for the 2025/26 school year.
Shenandoah baseball highlights from a win over Clarinda
