With only a handful of games left in the season, the University of Maine’s softball team is looking to finish the season strong. Among the many strengths of this team is their senior leadership. With a class of six seniors, captains like fourth-year left fielder Emily “EmJ” Fogel, hold the team together.

Fogel, a native of Vienna, Virginia, has been playing the game of softball since the age of 9 when she began to play travel ball. After her four-year stint as a starting outfielder and catcher at James Madison High School, she began to look to the future with softball in mind. Out of the 13 universities she visited, she chose UMaine to be her home for the next four years.

She was recruited by Coach Deb Smith, who retired from coaching just weeks after Fogel was recruited. The team stuck together and ran practices as a team until the current coach, Lynn Coutts, was hired to replace Smith. Amidst all the turmoil in the front office, the Black Bears held together and earned a berth in the America East playoffs.

“That was the first and only year so far that I’ve gone to the America East Conference tournament,” Fogel said, reflecting on her first year, “We really showed up and surprised a lot of people, including ourselves.”

Fogel has led the team this season on the field, at the plate and in the dugout. She showed this a couple weeks ago against the University of Massachusetts Lowell River Hawks, going 7-12 with two doubles, three runs batted in and scoring three runs during the series. At one point, she had six straight hits.

After her impressive series, Fogel is batting .333 with 18 RBIs and 10 runs scored. She currently sits in second on the team in batting average and is tied for the team lead in RBIs.

“That weekend I took a different approach to the plate. I think that I was more relaxed… I’m seeing [the ball] well and I was calm happy to be there and having fun,” Fogel said.

This relaxed approach to the plate contributes to her leadership style as a captain. She is the organizer and the loud one in the dugout, getting her teammates fired up or getting them honed in at the task at hand.

“I’m a talker. I’m the loud one in the dugout trying to keep everyone positive. I’m very much an organizer, doing some background, behind the scenes work,” Fogel said.

Whatever she and the two other captains, fourth-years Jessica Burk and Kristen Koslosky, have done as leaders is working, because the team has battled their way to the third place rank in America East. After a successful weekend sweep of Lowell, Fogel knows her team is ready for the home stretch.

“It’s huge for our confidence,” Fogel said on the Lowell sweep. “Our team is young, so not many of them know what it feels like to sweep a team. It’s a huge confidence booster, and it lets all the younger players believe in themselves a little more.”

Fogel said that the team is finding the right time to get going, winning six of their last 10 games.

“We’re doing really well and coming into our own at the right point in the season,” Fogel said, “I think this year is one of our best years for sure.”

This year has been successful for the Black Bears, whose defense and pitching are ranked highest in the conference. The young team is full of energy, according to Fogel and have met the expectations that were set at the beginning of the season.

“We were expected to be pretty scrappy, we were expected to hit well and be strong defensively and so far we’ve done those things. I think offensively we can be better, but as a group, we’re still learning,” Fogel said.

The team will have to learn how to handle one of the best teams in America East for their upcoming series, before finishing the rest of the season playing some of the bottom feeders in the conference.

“We’re the girls who have to work for runs,” Fogel said on the team’s offensive dynamic looking ahead, “We need to do our own part to make [the offense] happen. Once we start doing things it will start to click. I think it will have a snowball effect.”

Specifically looking to their next series, Fogel made it clear that the offense has to get working early and then produce often.

“We have to score first, score early, and score often. We need to make sure theirs we are helping our pitchers,” Fogel said, “We need to have enough runs so that our pitchers feel confident. They’re confident if we’re confident as a defense, but that all starts with scoring runs.”

If Fogel is able to hit like she did in the Lowell series, then the team should have no problem with giving their pitchers run support. Her role as a captain and offensive powerhouse aside, Fogel is just enjoying her time playing collegiate softball.

“As long as I am playing, I am having fun,” Fogel said.

The fun continues at home for the Black Bears as they will host the Hartford Hawks on April 25 and 26 in their final home series of the year.