After up-and-down freshman year, Plum grad Melanie Mienke expects better showing for UPG softball
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Like a lot of athletes experiencing their first year of college competition, Plum grad Melanie Mienke had her share of nerves. As a freshman pitcher/outfielder with the Pitt-Greensburg softball team, she wasn’t quite sure what to expect.
One thing was pretty clear, though: There weren’t going to be many places to hide in the Bobcats lineup. With a roster of only 14 players, including only two other pitchers, chances were good Mienke was going to get her number called at some point.
Mienke was, indeed, a regular part of coach Chuck Myers’ lineup. More often than not, she delivered.
The Bobcats struggled through much of the 2022 season, going 5-11 in the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference and 6-26 overall. But Mienke produced a solid season, going 6-9 with a 4.58 ERA over 931⁄3 innings. Her 84 strikeouts during the regular season led the AMCC, and she walked only 21.
“I think I was a little bit rocky at the beginning, but I felt more comfortable as the season went on and started to accomplish more of the goals I had set out with,” she said. “I had a really good senior year of high school, and I wanted to continue that in to college, and I felt like I accomplished that.
“I had a lot of strikeouts, and my pitches were crisp.”
Pitt-Greensburg often struggled to score last season, producing only 97 in 32 games (almost exactly 3.0 per game). As a result, some of Mienke’s best performances went unrewarded.
In a March 19 game against Waynesburg, Mienke gave up only one earned run in seven innings with seven strikeouts and no walks. UPG lost 2-0. A month later against La Roche, she struck out 10 and again gave up only one earned run in 61⁄3 innings but came up on the short end of a 2-1 loss.
That wasn’t always the case. On March 21 against Penn State Greater Allegheny, the offense gave her nine runs, more than enough as Mienke gave up one earned run in five innings with eight strikeouts in a 9-1 win. She also contributed a two-run double.
And she got three runs of support in an eight-strikeout, zero-walk effort against Mt. Aloysius that resulted in a 3-1 win.
Her highlight was an 11-4 win over Hilbert in which she struck out 10, scored three runs and drove in two.
Myers said he believes there might be a lot more afternoons this season when his team scores closer to 11 runs than one. With a bigger roster that includes a couple of experienced transfer players as well as six seniors, the Bobcats should have the depth to boost the offense.
Mienke, too, had her own hitting struggles. In 45 at-bats, she hit .178 with a double and seven RBIs. Much like her pitching, she said a better performance at the plate is a matter of confidence.
“I always get in my head and overthink it,” she said. “So I have really been working on that, trying to stay calm when I’m in the box. Now I’m just working on being consistent.”
Make no mistake, however, Mienke’s greatest value will be as a pitcher. Myers said she will see some field time this season, but, more often than not, she will be in the circle.
“I think she picked up a little bit of speed (since last season),” Myers said. “I think she throws a great rise ball, which keeps hitters off. … She has a lot to accomplish within the next three years, and she can leave her name on the record books as a leader in a lot of categories, so I expect her to step up.”
Mienke has been perfecting a straight curve to add to her repertoire. She has thrown a drop curve for a while, so, she said, picking up the straight curve wasn’t difficult.
It also helps to have a catcher with whom she has developed a strong rapport. Maddie Stonbraker, a junior from Punxsutawney, proved to be a steadying force for Mienke in her first season.
“Maddie is one of my best friends,” Mienke said. “She always gives me constructive criticism, always tells me when something is off. She always has a correction that really helps me when I can’t figure out what’s going wrong.
“And it helps that we have a relationship off the field, too. Maddie and I are both biology majors, so she helped me with that transition into classes from high school to college, too.”
The Bobcats open the season with a trip to Florida, where they are scheduled to play 10 games between March 5-10 before returning home to host Geneva on March 15.
Mienke is more confident in her team and herself this season and expects the results to show for both.
“I feel like, now that I have experience at the college level, that my nerves definitely won’t be as bad as they were last year,” she said. “And I think since I had a good freshman season, that helps build my confidence.
“I definitely think we might be a little underestimated this year, and we’re going to come in and surprise people.”