Marble Falls grad guides Jonesboro to softball state tourney
CAPTION: Amanda (Thomas) LeCroy (second from left) celebrates winning the Class 1A Region II championship with her parents Traci (left) and Gary (third from left) and her husband and assistant coach Cody LeCroy. Courtesy photo
In her first year as the Jonesboro High School softball head coach, Amanda (Thomas) LeCroy accomplished a task she and her Marble Falls High School teammates dreamed of.
Qualifying for the state tournament.
The Lady Eagles will face Slocum at 10 a.m. Tuesday, May 28, in a state semifinal contest of the Class 1A state tournament at the Red and Charline McCombs Field on the University of Texas at Austin campus.
The Lady Eagles (21-7, 9-1 District 12-1A runners-up) hung on for an 8-7 victory against Dodd City in regional final May 18.
LeCroy, who is a 2014 Marble Falls High School graduate, wasn’t sure who her team would face in the state semifinals.
“We have a great group of girls,” she said. “We have five freshmen. Four freshmen start. We have two sophomores, three juniors and a senior. We have a very athletic group of girls. They pushed softball for a long time. This is a softball town.”
Jonesboro began the contest by “scoring six runs right off the bat,” she said. The Lady Eagles added a run in the second to take a 7-0 advantage. But the Hornets scored a run in the second, three in the third and three in the fourth by taking advantage of a pitching change to tie the contest at 7-7.
The Lady Eagles scored a run in the fifth to break the tie.
“We took care of business and shut them down when we needed to,” LeCroy said. “We came out and put a team down. We worked that early. Dodd City wasn’t ready for that.”
Fortunately for LeCroy, the Lady Eagles could overcome her bad luck.
“I lost every single (coin) flip,” she said. “I wanted a series, and we were the visiting team (against Dodd City and Blum in the regional seminfinal).”
The regional semifinal, which Jonesboro won 13-12, was a six-hour affair when adding in the a weather delay.
In that contest, each team answered the other until the sixth inning. Tied at 2-2, Blum plated four runs for a 6-2 lead headed into the seventh inning.
The Lady Eagles answered by putting up 11 runs in the top of the seventh and then held off the Bobcats, who had scored six runs, to escape with the victory.
“We committed four errors and almost let them come back,” LeCroy said. “Blum is in our district, and we took care of business all three times (13-6 and 20-10).”
The coach got her start as a lifelong softball player, earning a spot Midwestern University team until she graduated in 2018. Then she spent five years there as an assistant coach. While recruiting, she met her husband, Cody, at Schreiner University. They married in 2022 and are expecting a daughter later this year.
“We’ll be chasing that yellow ball for some more,” she said.
The two landed jobs in Beaumont before that school closed. Her husband then accepted a job at Hamilton Independent School District, while she worked at Evant.
In addition to coaching softball at Jonesboro, Amanda is the volleyball head coach, while Cody is the girls athletic coordinator and girls basketball head coach. He also is the assistant volleyball and softball coach.
“Volleyball is a first-year program,” she said. “We competed. Those girls are a good group of athletic girls. We come back and fight. We struggled with that during the year. We started to see them fight during basketball. They’re finding a way to win.”
She knew while she was still a student at Marble Falls High School she wanted to be a coach. She gave pitching lessons to Piper Guenter, who helped her Texas Blaze Soriano-select softball team win two state titles six years ago.
“I always wanted to be a coach,” LeCroy said. “When I was 12 years old, I knew I wanted to play in college. I started with giving lessons. I enjoyed giving lessons. I had a lot of fun giving lessons.”
No matter how much they prepared and how hard they battled, LeCroy and the Lady Mustangs couldn’t get past the second round of the Class 5A playoffs. And no one knows the challenges and difficulty of advancing better than LeCroy.
She pointed out her parents, Traci and Gary Thomas, made sure she had a place to practice her skills at home and she played select softball for years before getting to Midwestern University.
“My parents did a lot for me,” she said. “I was outside every day putting in my own work. It definitely showed putting in the outside work on your own. Also knowing the game and having the IQ. That plays a big deal as well. My mom and dad still don’t miss a game. The players call them Gigi and Pawpaw.”
She also credited her high school coaches, Tino Salazar and Chelsea Heller, noting she has implemented some of the same drills and preparation during practices with her Lady Eagles.
“Those practices in high school still have a big influence,” LeCroy said. “Cody has helped with how we played and practiced. I’ve leaned on him a lot. It’s been an awesome experience. It’s awesome to get to do it with Cody.”
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CAPTION: The Jonesboro High School softball team with coaches Cody (left) and Amanda (Thomas) LeCroy (right) after the Lady Eagles won the regional title. Courtesy photo
