Ariana "Chickie" Elbaz '20 Recruiting Profile

Playing softball is a major part of my life and has been since the age of 12. I began playing competitive travel ball with the same organization since 2014 under the instruction of a former Division 1 softball player and I often play above my age bracket as a starting outfielder. I made the transition from playing years of competitive tennis and competitive equestrian riding to softball because I love being part of a team (talking to a horse can only get you so far) and I love softball. Softball is inextricably interwoven into every part of my life.

In my freshman year I was a finalist out of 300 entries in an academic competition about history. I designed an Ipad presentation that outlined the origins of softball all the way back to the "Big Bang" called the "Little Big History of Softball." I also aced my culinary class when I baked a vanilla "Chickie" cake from scratch in the shape of a softball and I dominated my sophomore English final when I sketched a graphic novel about my softball life titled "The Game that Changed My Life." I also designed a "Lady Cobras" CO2 racer in my technology class in a self-motivated project to study air resistance and friction.

As a repeating honor roll student with a love for science and a knack with numbers, I am looking to attend a university program that can help me integrate my athletic life with my interest in science and numbers.  Maybe I will find myself in the sports medicine field.  Maybe I will work my way into a world of sports biomedical analytics and can become a consultant or sports agent.  Or perhaps I will design a new composite bat that will change the game (and make lots of money).

When you love something that much you often excel at it. I am a prototypical outfielder relying on my speed and arm to support my team in the field.  I am a consistent switch hitter that can hit, slap, bunt; often hitting according to the situation at hand.  Sometimes it is a sac fly, or a rope to the gap, or placing the ball behind the runner, or putting down a suicide bunt.  When I get to the diamond you can often hear me say two things that tells you exactly how I play my game. 1) “I just smashed a SLUG,” after I hit an XBH. 2) “Nothing gets dropped; nothing gets passed,” when I run out of the dugout to take the field.